By ‘Sola Fagorusi
“I have read several times people saying that Boko Haram kidnapped 234 girls. They have not kidnapped only 234 girls, they have kidnapped our mothers of tomorrow. And if you look at it, as mothers of tomorrow, at an average of four children per girl, they have kidnapped close to 936 girls. If you multiply it by another four grandchildren (on the average) per mother, they have kidnapped close to 4,000 Nigerians” – Governor Abiola Ajimobi
The figures keep changing by the minute. As at the time of writing this, #BringBackOurGirls has been tweeted and retweeted more than 2,724,280 times in more than eight languages and several cultures in the last 30 days. It is unarguably the most successful twitter campaign and advocacy ever in the history of Nigeria. The country has become the nucleus of attention with the blinding beams of the international media, organisations and individuals on it. Nigeria, United States of America and the United Kingdom have been the nations where the most tweets are coming from according to Sysomos, a social media analytics organisation. South Africa is 5th and Ghana is 10th on the list of top ten nations tweeting about the fate of 276 Chibok girls (the figure offered by the Police and SSS). Nigeria, South Africa and Ghana are the only African countries on the list of top ten.
Nothing captures the explanation that the world is now a global village and fast becoming a one-world system like what we have seen happen with #BringBackOurGirls. It has nothing to do with Nigeria being the 26th largest economy in the world and the first in Africa on the basis of our Gross Domestic Product (GDP). It is entirely about humanity, the gift of empathy from some and that of sympathy from a bulk of the folks on twitter. China’s Xi Jinping, America’s Barack Obama, Britain’s David Cameron are some of the A-list politicians who have also offered their support to Nigeria in its attempt to find the Chibok girls who were last seen on the night of April 14th, 2014. Hundreds of Hollywood celebrities have also endorsed the campaign and donated tweets to the cause. Predictably, Nollywood celebrities have also been at the fore front of the campaign on social media to ensure it lights up the urgent call for action by our leaders. Nevertheless, it is the ordinary Nigerian who has before now regularly used social media technology to engage with issues that should be praised. It is the little drop of tweets in the water of twitter that has made this mighty ocean. It started this raging fire.
The closest Nigeria has had to this was the #OccupyNigeria protest. It was our golden moment. It was that moment when Nigerians almost took back the country. From Facebook, twitter, instagram and blogger, it seemed then to be an offense to say any other thing asides #OccupyNigeria. The #BringBackOurGirls campaign is a reminder of what Nigerians can achieve by the simple adoption of technology. And given the age group of people who dominantly use these tools, it is easy to predict on whose shoulders the change we so desire in Nigeria would rest on. President Goodluck Jonathan and his co-travellers in the corridors of power should certainly not be surprised. Afterall, the president was once reportedly credited by Mr. Labaran Maku, the Minister of Information, during a book launch in December 2010 as the one who brought Facebook to Nigeria! Beyond that, the presidency understands the power of social media and so stole the thunder of another presidential aspirant’s announcement party by declaring his ambition to contest for the presidency in the 2011 election through Facebook. They both shared the headline the next day in the national dailies. It is the same double edged tool that has roughly pushed the presidency into action following the global outrage about the kidnap.
The president is however correct in his recent submission that this might be the ‘beginning of the end of Boko Haram.’ The president perchance is drawing from the experience in Uganda when in 2012 the world stood with the country through #Kony2012 on twitter. Joseph Kony, a Christian and leader of Uganda’s Lord’s Resistance Army was leading conflicts in the country and had kidnapped and forcefully recruited about 30,000 children as soldiers. It was the Kony 2012 Youtube video created by Invisible Children, a humanitarian group and watched more than seven million times in the first three days that drew the international community’s attention causing Obama to send 100 U.S soldiers to Uganda. Before then, Kony and his ragtag group had thrived for about 27 years.
The new dynamics of warfare is that civilians now interface in military operations! Before now, it is not impossible that several people around the world never heard about Boko Haram and Abubakar Shekau, the one Nigeria’s Nobel Laureate and national conscience, Wole Soyinka as described as ‘a homicidal maniac’.
While the protests, events, rallies and sit-outs have also been a success given the massive citizenry interest, the first lady’s wrong approach at intervention has also added some dimension to the awareness about #BringBackOurGirls. Her hysteria on national television captured in a 156 seconds video by Channels Television has since found its way to Youtube. This is in addition to #ThereisGodoh which trended on social network for about two days thanks to her. Already there are about five different remix of the affair on YouTube and given the comic value, that was what it took for some individuals to understand and know that there were 276 missing girls. Comedy apparently has hidden depths!
When this is over, the government would need to sit down and re-access its communication approach. Despite its poor pace at making life bearable for Nigerians, its little efforts seems to be justifiably misinterpreted because of the cloak of secrecy they love to place on national issues. I hope the government understands that people are impatient for results. Nigerians and the world are anxious to have those girls back. It’s been repeated countless times that the presidency acted too late. If the president was clairvoyant to know how impactful the social media awareness which started following chants by former education minister Obiageli Ezekwesili at the Port Harcourt World Book Capital 2014 and initial tweets from Ibrahim Abdullahi, a bespectacled Abuja based attorney would be, it perhaps would have done something quick to save face. The activities around #BringBackOurGirls continues until the girls are found and details can be seen at www.bringbackourgirls.ng
Concerned Nigerian, activists and civil society organisations also need to look closely at this campaign to see what can be learnt to ensure that beyond this, Nigerians are no longer taken for granted.
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‘Sola Fagorusi
Sola Fagorusi is a youth development advocate, freelance writer, accomplished debater cum coach. The Obafemi Awolowo University graduate has about 10 years experience in social entrepreneurship which straddles leadership, good governance cum anti-corruption and adolescent reproductive health. The Leap Africa alumnus is also a trained peer educator, a DESPLAY alumnus and co-facilitator. For 2 years now, he has been a technical consultant and lead judge on the Intra-Faith Peace Youth TV Debate Project facilitated by Youngstars Foundation and the British High Commission. To read his full profile, click here. Follow Sola on twitter: @solafagro
