Top 20 African Presidents on Social Media ~ 2014
Just like businesses, political leaders globally must embrace social media as a great tool to deliver and control information, for better and real time governance. 5 months ago, a survey intended to access and rank the top 20 heads of State on Social media was initiated by Digital Impact Awards Africa. All Africa presidents’ social media channels on Facebook and Twitter were closely followed.
By close of survey, Africa’s top 10 heads of state were liked by at least 8,149,619 people and 8,698,202 for the top 20 on Facebook. Whereas on twitter, the top 10 Heads of state were followed by at least 1,434,041. It was from ratio of total number of people liking and following the heads of state on social media that the contribution of the each of the two world’s most popular social media platforms to this survey was determined.
Facebook contributed 83% and Twitter contributed 17%.
Egypt’s Abdel Fattah Elsisi (عبد الفتاح السيسي) is the most followed African Head of State with at least 2,951,560 people frequently interacting on his social media channels. He took gold for this first ever unique Digital survey on this continent. On a bad note though, his channels are rarely updated with information, the latest update on his channel by survey time was posted on 4th June 2014.
Nigeria’s Goodluck Jonathan took silver with at least 1,584,838 people following on twitter and Facebook whereas bronze went to Kenya’s Uhuru Kenyatta with at least 1,548,035 on his social media channels by survey time.
Uhuru is the most followed African head of state on Twitter with at least 466,000 followers.
By survey time, at most 5 presidents’ Facebook pages and at least 8 twitter pages were certified.
16 heads of state had less than 10,000 likes on Facebook and 14 Heads of state had no official, publicly searchable Facebook pages. Despite several searches and automatic engine crawls to identify different keywords with links to Facebook and Twitter, all results returned no pages that this survey could relate to them but just a few user accounts on Facebook in the different presidents’ names.
11 heads of state had at least 100,000 likes on Facebook. Unlike the majority, Rwanda’s Paul Kagame and Tanzania’s Jakaya Kikwete had more followers on twitter than likes on Facebook. Kagame and Kikwete were followed by 421,568 and 159,254 on twitter respectively.
Kenya’s Uhuru Kenyatta is the most active head on state on social media with at least one post daily on Facebook and twitter, and his team often responds to followers queries and comments. His social media outlook evidently showcases that he has invested in high class branding and content production for the best delivery of information. Uhuru’s agency gets credit for the special professional work. Just like MTN’s everywhere you go slogan, you will find Uhuru everywhere you go on social media, as he well equipped with classy website, Uhuru is on YouTube and instagram among other social media platforms.
Uganda’s Yoweri Museveni and Rwanda’s Kagame have the fastest growing channels on the two social media platforms.
In other related searches, this survey found out that at least 30 African heads of state have fully informed Wikipedia profiles, and at most 10 had fully functional personal websites. Whereas less than 5 heads of state have embraced YouTube.
This study follows a number of surveys that Digital Impact Awards Africa and partners have carried out such as, the Top 20 Corporate Brands on Social Media survey, among others. Remember to join the best brains in Digital, come Friday 22nd August at the inaugural Digital Impact Awards Africa.
Below is a full list of the top 20 African heads of State Social Media.
The survey was conducted by Digital Impact Awards Africa and proudly supported by HiPipo Consulting, Research and Advisory arm with Cyberplc Limited.
Download full report: Top 20 African Presidents on Social media ~ 2014
