This essay is the second and concluding tranche of my piece titled, ''How The U.S, Facebook And Big Data Can Swing Nigeria’s 2019 Elections''. Read the Part 1 of the essay here if you are yet to.
History of The US
Government, Establishments Meddling in Elections
The United States is not alien to overtly and covertly trying to
swing the outcome of election of other countries. Political
scientist Dov Levin of the Carnegie Mellon University asserts that the US interfered in elections of at least 85 countries worldwide between 1946 and
2000. Levin
figures that the "the United States and Russia intervened
in 117 elections around the world from 1946 to 2000 — an average of once in
every nine competitive elections." According to
Levin’s research, strategies deployed by the US include: ‘’peddling
misinformation or propaganda; creating campaign material for preferred
candidates or parties; providing or withdrawing foreign aid, and; making public
announcements that threaten or favor certain candidates, covertly delivering
large sums of cash, as was the case in elections in Japan, Lebanon, Italy, and
other countries’’.
Nigeria’s erstwhile president Goodluck Jonathan blamed former
president Barack Obama for his 2015 presidential election defeat to Muhammadu
Buhari. Jonathan
alleged
that the former US president headed a global
conspiracy to get rid of him. Jonathan is quoted as saying that, ‘’Obama and his officials made it very clear to me by their
actions that they wanted a change of government in Nigeria and were ready to do
anything to achieve that purpose”. The statement credited to Jonathan further
said, “I got on well with Prime Minister David Cameron but at some point, I
noticed that the Americans were putting pressure on him and he had to join them
against me. “But I didn’t realize how far President Obama was prepared to go to
remove me until France caved in to the pressure from America. There are
insinuations that the United States had a hand in the death of MKO Abiola who
won the disputed 1993 presidential election. This is because on July 8, 1998,
Chief MKO Abiola died under ‘’mysterious circumstances’’ in the presence of two
ranking US officials. Gist out there is that the U.S. helped ‘’balance the
equation’’, stabilized Nigeria sequel to the demise of the then Head of state,
General Sani Abacha.
 |
| Former President Goodluck Jonathan |
Facebook’s Offer To
‘’Help’’ Nigeria, A Trojan Horse?
Lately, a Facebook
team led by Ebele Okobi (Facebook’s Public Policy Director for Africa) visited
Nigeria’s Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to explore various
ways in which they could synergize ahead of the 2019 elections. I was curious and jolted by the headline: ‘’To ensure stability,
Facebook will “help” Nigeria with its upcoming general elections.’’ The Facebook team
is quoted as saying, “people care very deeply about how they are governed,
about who governs them and other political issues. Knowing that people come to
the platform to talk about what they care about, we have developed a politics
and government programme essentially to understand how our platform is being
used, not just during elections, but also to help governments engage with their
citizens and also to see what the risks related to our platform in elections
are and what opportunities and programmes can be put in place to address the
risks.” Out of Facebook’s
membership base of 2.1 billion monthly active worldwide, over 16
million are Nigerians, the highest in Africa,
making Nigerians the most active users in Africa”.
The curious part of me will like to know why a capitalist
information hegemon, a Facebook that was (in)advertently complicit in the
outcome of the 2016 United States presidential election and Brexit, intends
‘’helping’’ the Nigerian government during its election? Is Facebook a charity
organization? Why did Facebook not "help" the US government against
the Russians during the Trump/Hillary presidential election? According
to Trump’s digital campaign director, Brad Parscale, the Trump campaign had
Facebook employees “embedded inside our offices”, providing guidance on how the
platform could be used to target voters. Russia-backed Facebook posts
reportedly 'reached 126m Americans' during US election.
Facebook
screenshots from June 2017_ left_ and March 2018_right_ show that the social
network removed its Government and Politics_ section_ Source The Intercept
In its report
titled: ‘’Facebook Quietly Hid WebPages Bragging Of Ability To Influence
Elections’’, United States-based fearless
and adversarial investigative journalism platform, ‘’The
Intercept’’, chronicled how Facebook deleted its “success stories” drop-down
menu that once included an entire section for “Government and Politics”.
Facebook is said to have used link and video ads to boost Hispanic voter
turnout for Florida’s Republican Governor, Rick Scott and also gave a UK
political party, the Scottish National Party, a “triggering a landslide.”
Another report by ‘’True Pundit’’ cites how ‘’Facebook’s Recent
Algorithm Change Is Crushing Conservative
Sites, Boosting Liberals’’. The report went further to say, ‘’This algorithm
change, intentional or not, has in effect censored conservative viewpoints on
the largest social media platform in the world. This change has ramifications
that, in the short-term, are causing conservative publishers to downsize or
fold up completely, and in the long-term could swing elections in the United
States and around the world toward liberal politicians and policies.’’
In Turkey, Facebook - reportedly under Turkish government pressure – deleted the Facebook accounts
of people expressing solidarity with Rojava, an autonomous Kurdish province in
northern Syria which plays a leading role in rolling back ISIS. Facebook routinely censors comments of government critics in India, Pakistan and
Morocco. Sources who spoke to the New York Times, say Facebook built software
that could potentially accommodate censorship demands in China. Facebook is
said to massively delete posts by Rohingya activists documenting the violence
against their men, women and children.
In April 2017, Facebook publicly acknowledged for the first time that its platform had been
exploited by governments seeking to manipulate public opinion in other
countries, including during the presidential elections in the US and France. The
FBI has since charged 13 Russians and three companies for running what it
claims was a ‘’cyber-warfare movement’’ against the United States. British lawmakers and the European Parliament have
summoned
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg to give evidence over the scandal involving
embattled Cambridge Analytica.
No wonder a certain John Robb, former counter-terrorism operative
in the US Special Operations Command and long-time US military intelligence
advisor on the future of artificial intelligence and robotics warfare to
agencies like the NSA and CIA, tells us that, ‘’Facebook will become the “most
powerful government contractor” in the world, in less than ten years’’. Robb
reckons that, ‘’with unprecedented access to global population dynamics,
capability for real-time tracking on nearly everyone on the planet using smartphone
GPS data and ancillary information including pictures, posted links and likes,
Facebook has the capacity to “create the largest micro-targeting database on
earth”, replete with intimate details on the interests of billions of people.’’
Robb opines that, ‘’Facebook’s mass surveillance capabilities will be even more
powerful than that of the NSA. The relationship between governments and
Facebook for global influence operations is increasingly symbiotic. Governments
want to influence people and they are willing to pay Facebook handsomely to
help them do it.’’
Conclusion:
Denouncing
Russia’s interference in the 2016 US presidential election, former US Vice
President Joe Biden said, “They have no damn right,”. “It’s our sovereign right to be able to
conduct our elections unfettered. Period.” In the same vein, Nigerians MUST be allowed to choose, elect their leaders.
I implore all Nigerians of voting age to obtain their
PVC’s and be VIGILANT. While we are at it, the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC,
MUST ensure a credible election; rein in rigging and under-aged voting
prevalent in parts of the country. Our votes MUST count!
Written By: ©Don Okereke
For more information, Google or click on the links to read up the revealing references below:
1. ‘’The CIA Has Been Undermining Governments For Years’’
7. ‘’The long history of the U.S. interfering
with elections elsewhere’’
9. ‘’Facebook Failed To Protect 30 Million Users
From Having Their Data Harvested
By Trump Campaign Affiliate'
10.
Research in India suggests Google search results (Search Engine Manipulation Effect, SEME)
can influence an election.
11.
“Big data revolutionized the way American politicians win elections. In the process, it
broke American politics.”
16.
‘’Practical
ways to restructure Nigeria before 2019 election’’
***Above online references were accessed between 10-20 March, 2018
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