As Nigeria prepares for the 2015 General Elections scheduled for 28th March, UNDP facilitated a dialogue with online publishers as part of efforts aimed at promoting peaceful elections in the country.
The dialogue which took place on 10th February, came at a time when Nigeria’s political parties are increasingly using non-traditional media platforms and tools to campaign and engage with the general public.
This move towards cyber-mediated engagement has been fuelled by the growing realization that a huge percentage of Nigerians are online and are actively engaging on issues in the democratic space.
Nigeria is currently ranked 8th on the global internet engagement scale with more than 73 million people that actively engage the internet. Noting that majority of online social media users are youths, it is important that engagements with them on these platform promote peace and constructive dialogue on development issues affecting the country.
UNDP, through its Democratic Governance for Development (DGD II) project initiated this dialogue with publishers of on-line news media to advocate for increased professionalism in their reporting and commitment to support aimed at ensuring that the forthcoming election are held in a peaceful environment.
