Disir
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- Sep 30, 2011
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In 2010, protests swept across North Africa and the Middle East after a Tunisian vendor self-immolated in protest of police confiscating his cart. During those protests, activists’ skillful use of social media was pivotal in mobilizing the public and ultimately toppling strongmen like Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak. Since then, African leaders have turned to increasingly sophisticated forms of censorship to limit free speech and curb people’s ability to organize via platforms. Their most recent strategy: taxing people for using social media. Although African leaders claim they need these taxes to shore up government revenue, social media taxes are merely censorship cloaked in an economic argument.
More on:
Central Africa
Social Media
Censorship and Freedom of Expression
To put Africans’ internet use into context: at least 213 million Africans use the internet, and 191 million use various social media platforms with Facebook, YouTube and Twitter being the most dominant. An influential 2016 report suggested that political discourse on Twitter is on the rise in Africa, with Africans having a higher rate of political tweets than people in the United States and the United Kingdom.
In Africa, A New Tactic to Suppress Online Speech: Taxing Social Media
Which makes it increasingly difficult to push someone else's propaganda.
More on:
Central Africa
Social Media
Censorship and Freedom of Expression
To put Africans’ internet use into context: at least 213 million Africans use the internet, and 191 million use various social media platforms with Facebook, YouTube and Twitter being the most dominant. An influential 2016 report suggested that political discourse on Twitter is on the rise in Africa, with Africans having a higher rate of political tweets than people in the United States and the United Kingdom.
In Africa, A New Tactic to Suppress Online Speech: Taxing Social Media
Which makes it increasingly difficult to push someone else's propaganda.
