Search
Archives
Microblogging
- @rashidaljassim لا اوكي ذكرتهم انت خخخخ in reply to rashidaljassim 2012-10-09
- More updates...
Powered by Twitter Tools
Bahrain 2010 Elections: Social Media Winners and Losers
Almost a month has passed since the elections, and I think it’s time to evaluate and see how well the ‘web warriors‘ did in the elections. But before we do that, I just wanted to highlight some of the other tools used for election campaigns and on voting day.
YouTube
Since political ads are not aired on local TV (for a number of different reasons), many political societies and some independant candidates turned to YouTube to convey their messages to their voters. Most were either cringeworthy or Windows Movie Maker disasters and I apologize for raping your eyes during the next videos
Al-Wefaq
Al-Minbar Al-Taqadomi Al-Demoqrati
Al-Asala
Al-Minbar Al-Islami
Independent Isa Salmeen
http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=103854216346976
Most of the videos above did not reach any big audiences mostly averaging around 100-150 views only. On the other hand the biggest and best YouTube campaign was Waad’s series of ads, recorded speeches and seminars. The most daring and meaningful of the ads was this one, discussing the allegations of military personnel being ordered to vote for “government friendly” candidates and encouraging them to follow “their own will, not the will of others”
SMS: Settled Massive Scores
We did mention SMS text messages before as a means of campaigning and of spreading rumours against rival candidates. In 2010 the campaigns were as ferocious and many people bemoaned the “spamminess” of such text messages. This was especially true in the second round of voting and in particular the Central 8th district (Ali Zayed vs Dr. Abdulatif Al-Shaikh) where both camps bombarded voters with almost hourly SMS messages to encourage them to vote and even offer transportation to and from the polling stations.
In an interesting turn of events, the Shia voters despite not favouring any of the candidates, were compelled to vote against the former MP after a falling out in regards to a housing project between four towns in his district. They sent out mass SMS messages to many voters to vote against Al-Shaikh which eventually led to him losing his seat to Ali Zayed.
..And now on to The Losers
1. Former MP Sami Al-Buhairi
We highlighted him as one of the biggest winners in using social media but unfortunately he lost by a very substantial margin. His friends list on Facebook now hovers around 900 friends whereas in the polling he only received 300 votes!
His biggest flaw was his lack of FOCUS in attracting his voters. It seems that he did not consider the age of his FB friends nor their eligibility to vote nor where they actually lived . Moral of the story: Randomly adding friends on Facebook doesn’t win you votes.
2. MP Isa Al-Kooheji
“But he won the election!” Yes, he did but his web strategy was very flawed and hardly played a role in him winning the election. I admire his use of WordPress, YouTube and Flickr but they only were used as archives of him opening his campaign tent and celebrating his win, very few of the blog posts talked about his program and were more focused on quashing rumours surrounding him.
His Facebook profile was the same, an archive of his campaign ads and events and nothing about his program. But his biggest flaw is not ENGAGING with his FB friends/ potential voters as no one can post anything on his Facebook wall almost as if putting a ‘wall’ between him and his friends and not giving an opportunity for people to discuss and share ideas with him.
Moral of the story: If you’re going to use social media, ENGAGE with your audience and be part of the conversation.
3. Most losing candidates
Many candidates knew that Facebook is very popular so they decided to start Facebook groups (or let their children do it for them) then add a few friends (usually the children’s friends whom are usually not eligible to vote) and hardly update their profile thus making it a waste of time and meaningless. The smallest candidate group I saw only had 29 members and I couldn’t find it anywhere (deleted?)
Moral of the story: GRAB ATTENTION by actively adding content on the Facebook Page or Group and inviting more friends to spread word of mouth.
..And the winners are
1. Municipality Council member (MCM) Fatima Salman
I must admit, she didn’t really use Social Media in her election campaign but she has a promising start in engaging with her Facebook friends as a council member by posting news links and images of her visits around her district and highlighting some of the problems the community are facing including lack of trash containers and poor lighting on streets and public parks and playgrounds etc.
Her friends are also able to post on her wall and share their thoughts and questions.
I honestly don’t know if she actually adds the content herself or has someone to do that for her, it’s still a good sign and I hope she gets better at connecting with her community via social media in the future.
2. Waad
Despite not winning any seats, Social media played a big role in their campaign and learned a lot from Obama’s infamous presidential campaign. Like Obama, Waad’s tech savvy approach related well with younger voters and Bahrainis in general with the incredible amount of rich content being added on a daily basis on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter. Waad also increased their dependancy on social networks, after their newsletter was stopped for allegedly break the publication laws in Bahrain two months before the election, and used them to circulate their election program and kickstart the Nationalist movement in Bahrain once again.
The Dragonfly Effect by Jennifer Aaker is a great guide on how to use social media for social change, and one of the main ‘formulas’ she discusses is FOCUS + GET and Waad ticked all those boxes:
- FOCUS: They focused on specific target groups during their campaign such as young voters and military personnel by creating specific content aimed at them.
- GRAB ATTENTION: The quality of the daily updated materials became viral both on Facebook and Twitter thus helping them gain over 4,500 friends and fans between their candidates
- ENGAGE: Creating discussions through content and status updates.
- TAKE ACTION: Like the previous video aimed at military personnel to vote freely rather than simply following orders.
Waad’s General Secretary Ebrahim Sharif has praised this campaign as a victory in expanding their supporter base especially with the younger generations and I think this video really says it all
Bahrain 2010 Elections:..And the results are in!
The Bahrain 2010 elections concluded this morning, with nine of the remaining seats settled in a 2nd round of voting. Al-Minbar Al-Islami bloc won only two of four seats with Dr. Ali Ahmed beating Waad’s Ebrahim Sharif by a small 200 vote margin (Muharraq 3rd) and Mohamed Al-Imadi fending off Asala-backed Independant Jamal Dawood (Northern 6th). Al-Asala bloc won two extra seats making their tally to four seats in parliament where bloc leader Ghanim Al-Buainain passed by Abdulnaser Ibrahim (Muharraq 8th) and 1st timer Ali Al-Zayed beat Al-Minbar Al-Islami’s head Dr. Abdullateef Al-Shaikh (Central 8th) by the slimmest margin of 31 votes!
The remaining five seats were won by Independant candidates kicking out two Minbar, one Al-Asala and Waad’s Dr. Muneera Fakhro. Southern 3rd’s Ahmed Al-Mulla won his seat after his opponent Sh.Sharikh Al-Doseri received orders from the Doseri Tribe’s head for Al-Dammam (KSA) and Bahrain, Sh. Isa bin Ali Al-Doseri to step down as Ahmed Al-Mulla (retired military judge and counselor at the Foreign Ministry) was clearly the “more qualified candidate” in a gesture of Bedouin generosity.
Shapes of things to come
Despite the loss of nearly half of the previous Minbar-Asala alliance’s seats, the 2010 parliament is still an Islamist dominated one with 18 Al-Wefaq, four Al-Asala, two Minbar and Jassim Al-Saeedi, the extreme Salafi Independant making a total of 25 seats.
From the remaining fifteen, there are whispers of the creation of an “Economic bloc” with Isa Al-Kooheji, Adel Al-Asoumi, Othman Al-Rayis, Latifa Al-Gaoud and Abdulla Al-Dossary all having some business backgrounds.
Upgrades
This parliament as sixteen new faces with three MPs (Adnan Al-Malki, Isa Al-Qadhi and Abdulmajeed Al-Sibi’a) upgrading from the Municipality Councils.
Muharraq’s 2nd district made history today by voting in Ms. Fatima Salman as the first woman to be voted in as a Municipality Council member after women failed to get into office in 2002 and 2006.
Two other women reached the 2nd round of voting with Waad’s Dr. Muneera Fakhro losing to Isa Al-Qadhi for MP of Central 4th and Ms. Subah Al-Doseri losing to Ali Al-Moqla for Municipality Council seat in Muharraq’s 7th by a small 350 vote margin.
Nationalists despite defeat should be upbeat
All three of Waad’s candidates failed to win in their districts, despite doing an excellent job with promoting their campaigns and squashing their “terror supporter” tag from the mass media to reach the 2nd round in two districts and receiving a 45% vote with Sami Siyadi.
Al-Minbar Al-Taqadomi’s head Dr. Hasan Madan gave Al-Wefaq’s Jawad Fairooz a scare by winning an impressive 4788 votes (44%) in Northern 8th district and he is already aiming at running for MP again in 2014 by keeping close to his voters.
General Polling stations and military staff
The ghost of the 2006 election General Polling stations where large numbers of “mystery ballots” from these stations changed the outcome in a number of districts (most notably against Waad candidates) haunted many candidates in 2010, but up to this moment there is no sign of their influence in any of the races as all districts were won and lost inside their branch polling stations without them changing the outcome.
The winner of the Halloween costume contest this year were the military zombies who were directed to whom they will cast their votes beforehand and vote for “pro govt.” candidates, as confirmed by a number of friends and acquaintances.
Let’s all hope that these 40 MPs try to improve the quality of our lives by ensuring our rights and giving us opportunities to grow and develop as a country.
Bahrain 2010 First Round: Extinction of Al-Minbar Al-Islami?
[Updated]
Well, the first round results looked very different from my “Fantasy 35″ with Al-Wefaq getting full marks with 18/18 districts keeping their status as the largest bloc in parliament. Al-Asala bloc is now slimmer winning only 2 seats and three candidates (Ebrahim Bu-Sandal, Ghanim Al-Buainain and Ali Zayed) going to the 2nd round. Al-Minbar on the other hand look on the verge of extinction as they have yet to win a single seat with 4 candidates fighting for their representation in the 2nd round.
As for Waad, only Sami Siyadi has lost the elections against Othman Al-Rayis (Independant) with both Ebrahim Shairf and Dr. Munira Fakhro into the 2nd round. If both candidates win their seats the opposition bloc will take up half of the parliament which is encouraging with the rise of Independants and we might see some progress with less sectarian tensions inshalla.
Al-Asala/ Al-Minbar Fallout:
Both blocs created a coalition in 2006 winning over 10 seats between them, but the scenario has changed in 2010 as a well documented fallout has led candidates from both blocs battle it out most notably in the 7th and 8th Central districts as MP Abdulhaleem Murad (Al-Asala) fought out fierce competition from Abdulrahman Al-Hasan (Minbar), whereas in the 8th Central the Asala-Minbar clashes has led to 2nd rounds in both the Parliamentary elections with Dr. Abdullatif Al-Shaikh, the head of the Minbar bloc facing off with 1st timer Ali Zayed of Al-Asala and in the Municipality elections with Waleed Hijris , two time winner from Al-Minbar against Yousif Al-Sabbagh of Al-Asala.
So far, Al-Asala has a slight advantage as many voters are dissapointed with Al-Minbar’s showing in the two previous parliaments and are more likely to vote against them. This fallout has also benefitted a number of Independant candidates with Abdulla bin Huwail (2nd Southern) and Isa Kooheji (5th Muharraq) bulldozing over Mohammed al-Muhanidi of Al-Asala (2nd Southern) and both Rashid Abdulrahman (Asala) and Dr. Adnan Bu-Motai’a (Minbar) in the 5th Muharraq respectively.
Bahrain Elections 2010: My Fantasy 35
Well today is 23rd October 2010, the third elections since the National charter in 2002. Today approximately 320,000 voters will vote for 35 parliamentary seats after five were won by default without competition. With the democratic mood I’m in today, I decided to pick my own “fantasy 35″ to complete what would be a reasonable parliament from my point of view and from the slim picking in a big percentage of the constituencies!
The eye-catching features in this Fantasy 35 is that all three Waad candidates win their seats (including one woman, Munira Fakhro) and four other women win their seats, making it a whopping 6 women in office. This of course means that some Islamic blocs like Al-Wefaq, Al-Menbar Al-Islami and Al-Asala lose some seats whilst Independants keep a healthy 12 seats. Al-Wefaq are still the largest bloc with 13 seats.
I sincerely hope that the parliament looks a little bit like this, and if so, Bahrainis can feel a little bit more optimistic about their futures and the corrupted will break into a sweat.
Only a few hours will tell us what the parliament and what the next four years will store for us..
Do you agree with this fanatsy 35? If not, tell us who would you like to see instead!
Bahrain 2010 elections take on the web!
With the 2010 elections just three weeks away, the country has turned into one big camping festival with tents and the smells of grilled meat mountains of rice, all to convince, “buy” or force voters to vote for one of their constituency’s candidates.
Text Wars
When it comes to using technology, the last elections were the battlefield of the SMS wars, where voters were smothered by candidate announcements, greetings and congratulations and of course rumours and good ol’ fashioned backstabbing.
Now in 2010, with voters more wary of giving their phone numbers to candidates and changing their number as if it were dirty underwear every few months, candidates needed a new way to do the “announcements, greetings and congratulations and of course rumours and good ol’ fashioned backstabbing” .
Here comes the Blackberry craze into play.
With about a gazillion BB users in Bahrain, candidates and their supporters (or dissers) have been pushing broadcasts which have gone on and spread like wildfire causing some controversy [Ar]. Blackberry Messenger has also been a platform for spreading funny campaign images most notably “Bu Nimir” or “Tiger Dude” who is a candidate running in Muharraq governorate. We have yet to see if this ‘viral’ ad campaign will go in his favour.
Ban the banners
Election campaigns in Bahrain usually involve putting up posters and billboards on every main road, nook and cranny. To anyone with a design background it’s living in a nightmare for a whole month where most candidates use Powerpoint monstrosities and blow them in into 4×3 m billboards. Some are taken down for no sane reason and others get simply vandalized .
Unfortunately some candidates have found another way to stuff their ill designed campaign ads down our throats.. Through Web Forums!
From: http://www.b4bh.com
The amount of blinking and beginner Flash skills and effects, may well cause epilepsy to some of you readers so be warned.
When moving the cursor over the ads to see if they are linked to other pages, shockingly most were merely static , ads to be ads – not gateways to their websites or Facebook pages..
Which takes us to..
In your face, Facebook
Like most of the world, Facebook has taken Bahrain by storm with over 237500 users to date (Facebakers.com) and only Google receives more traffic weekly.
Naturally, the more tech savvy candidates created their own personal profiles and/or started Facebook Groups and Pages (yes there is a difference between the two).
Waad’s candidates have been quite active on their Facebook Pages and linking their pages with their Waad2010 Twitter account. They have been posting all the latest developments with their campaigns and programs. The three Waad candidates’ Pages all average with 1,000 likes each.
Candidate Isa Al-Kooheji’s profile has the largest Facebook following with over 907 friends, and is one of the few candidates who owns and maintains a campaign blog http://www.isabahrain.com with multimedia content including a YouTube channel and a Flickr account.
But the most noteable user of Facebook has been MP Sami Al-Buhairi , having been in office for eight years and being notoriously quiet during those years, he has been a roaring success on Facebook.
Being on Facebook since 2008, MP Al-Buhairi had gained roughly 130 friends up to two months before the elections, where he started his Facebook campaign which lead him to gain over a whopping 817 friends at the time of writing. This means that he has been gaining 20-30 new friends daily.
MP Sami Al-Buhairi's Facebook Profile
MP Al-Buhairi’s web victories don’t just stop there.
Bahrain2010.com, a website dedicated in covering this year’s elections and run by Zajil Press, added a feature allowing its visitors to “vote” for their favourite candidates. Not only did MP Al-Buhairi win in his constituency but gained the most votes by any candidate on the site at 186 votes.
Women are winning the race..Online
Bahrain has yet to have a women elected into the parliament (MP Latifa Al-Gaoud has won her seat in 2006 and 2010 by default without competition), but on Bahrain2010.com’s Vote feature three women won their constituency’s seats.
Waad’s Candidate Munira Fakhro has the biggest campaign Facebook Page with over 1,746 Likes overtaking but a large margin her fellow Waad candidates Ibrahim Sharif and Sami Siyadi with 1,300 and 699 Likes respectively.
Time will only tell if all the “web warrior” candidates succeed with their use of the internet and especially Web 2.0 and Social Web applications in the elections.
If we do see candidates enter parliament because of their online campaigns and realise how powerful a tool it is to reach out to their voters, I sincerely hope that they push for legislation to regain freedom of publication online and end the arresting and alleged torture of bloggers and online journalists like Ali #Abdulemam without being charged of any crime.