Dream delayed or dream betrayed: politics, youth agency and the mobile revolution in Africa

ABSTRACT

The “mobile revolution” in Africa celebrates mobile telephony as reconfiguring political mobilization and transforming individual and collective political agency. Beyond politics, scholars tend to focus on the critical role of mobile phones in economic advancement in Africa. Less consideration has been given to the use of technology by governments to control civil and political dissent, and the complex nature of “slacktivism,” “clicktivism” or “armchair activism” impacting African youth agency. This paper examines disenfranchised African youths’ complicated adaptation of digital technology for political mobilization against parallel repression by governments. I use as case studies the fall of President Yahya Jammeh of The Gambia and President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe.

RÉSUME

La « révolution mobile » en Afrique encense la téléphonie mobile comme un instrument de la reconfiguration de la mobilisation politique et de la transformation de la capacité à agir individuelle et collective. Au-delà de la politique, les universitaires ont tendance à se concentrer sur le rôle essentiel des téléphones mobiles dans le progrès économique en Afrique. Moins d’attention a été prêtée à l’utilisation de la technologie par les gouvernements dans le but de contrôler la dissidence civile et politique, et à la nature complexe des « slacktivisme », « clicktivisme » ou « fauteuil révolutionnaire » qui impactent la capacidé à agir des jeunes africains. Cet article examine l’adaptation compliquée de la technologie numérique par des jeunes africains privés de leurs droits pour la mobilisation politique contre la répression parallèle exercée par les gouvernements. J’exploite, en tant qu’études de cas, la chute du Président Yahia Jammeh de la Gambie et celle du Président Robert Mugabe du Zimbabwe.

KEYWORDS:

• Democracy
• mobile revolution
• youth
• political mobilization
• agency
• slacktivism
• social media

MOTS-CLÉS:

• Démocratie
• révolution mobile
• jeunes
• mobilisation politique
• capacité à agir
• slacktivisme
• médias sociaux

Acknowledgements

This essay originated from a paper co-presented with Bissy Waariyo at the 2017 CAAS conference at Ryerson University, Toronto. Her contributions to the essay, as well as research assistance work by Justine Cosby, are hereby acknowledged. The research for the essay was partly facilitated by a grant for Early Career Research Award by the Faculty of Arts and Social Science, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. The term “traditional” in this context is used advisedly – for surely post-independence social movements were different from the varied social movements that comprised the anti-colonial movement in various countries.

2. African examples of the power of the media include the use of smart technology to record damning footage used to expose powerful male lecturers in Ghana and Nigeria in a “sex for grades” documentary. There is also the Tiger Eye documentary in Ghana which led to the dismissal of several Ghanaian judges and officials who were filmed taking bribes.

3. Rutherford (2016, 1) offers a fascinating study of the “precarious livelihood … in the new agrarian landscape” consequent upon “the massive, and often chaotic, land redistribution exercise that began in 2000.”

4. This generally recycled claim has been contested in recent years. See Kate Wilkinson’s study (2015) “Is Zimbabwe’s Adult Literacy Rate the Highest in Africa?” published at https://africacheck.org/reports/is-zimbabwes-adult-literacy-rate-the-highest-in-africa/, accessed 31 July 2019.

5. The ZCTU was the crucial driver of this movement, and one could argue that the NCA was partially a vehicle of key people in the trade union movement.

6. See Loum (2002, 143–153). It should be noted that an attempted coup against Jawara and his party also took place in 1981. The coup lasted about a week and resulted in the deaths of 500 civilians before the Senegalese military intervened (Perfect 2008, 429).

7. Mobile providers in Zimbabwe include Econet Wireless, NetOne and Telecel (ZARnet) (GSMA Intelligence 2017).

8. It should be noted that “overthrow” is largely the regime’s perspective, while many activists simply wanted to challenge its policies and ensure a fair election – in which ZANU-PF would likely lose.

9. Mobile providers in The Gambia include Africell (Lintel), Comium and Gamcel (Gamtel) (GSMA Intelligence 2017).

10. See “The Gambia” (2017), Africa Research Bulletin: Political, Social and Cultural Series 54(5), 21,429B–21,429C. doi:10.1111/j.1467-825X.2017.07668.x

11. In 2009, Jammeh appointed Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi as the Grand Commander of the Order of the Republic of The Gambia. However, in a strange turn of events, during the 2011 Arab Spring Jammeh called on Gaddafi to resign (Vines 2016).

12. Mugabe’s regime also charged several international socialist activists with plotting his overthrow for simply screening a documentary on the Arab Spring. A few years later they were finally cleared of these charges.

13. More recently, some of Africa’s (and other) totalitarian regimes stepped up efforts to gag or police social media. Examples include the Sudan, Cameroun, some Middle Eastern countries, Hong Kong and China.

14. A key example is the loss of faith in the electoral system which results in poor youth participation in the electoral process.

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Nduka Otiono

Nduka Otiono is a writer, associate professor and Graduate Program Supervisor at the Institute of African Studies, Carleton University, Canada. He is the author and co-editor of eight books of creative writing and academic research. Prior to turning to academia, he was for many years a journalist in Nigeria, General Secretary of Association of Nigerian Authors, founding member of the Nigerian chapter of UNESCO’s Committee on Oral and Intangible Cultural Heritage and founding member of the Board of the $100,000 annual Nigerian Prize for Literature. His recent books are Polyvocal Bob Dylan: Music, Performance, Literature (2019) and Wreaths for a Wayfarer: An Anthology of Poems in Honor of Pius Adesanmi (2020).