One of Ghana's False Viral Posts Highlight The Power of Social Media Misinformation

Sunday, 19 May 2024

By TB Obwoge

I will break down that with better education and social media platforms stricter rules on sharing misinformation, there would be less posts like this one. Facebook, Twitter and TikTok are very lazy when it comes to users posting fake news and misinformation.

Here is a post shared to over a million users on TikTok about a nonsense, misinformation post by a TikTok user about Burkina Faso.

One of the most difficult things to deal with living in Ghana, the educational system. I couldn't, for years understand why basic communication in Ghana was so difficult, the education is one of the worst in the world according to their own news.

Ghanaians often use odd meanings to words and phrases and it make understanding them very difficult. As a matter of fact I have written about how the meanings of many words are changed, you can read about that by clicking here.

Also I know that every country in the world has their local dialects and slangs, however as I've spoken to many in Ghana, they don't seem to understand that their meansing are changed or that their local word usage isn't proper English.

When trying to handle sometimes very important information and business in Ghnaa it becomes very difficult. Also the comprehenshion is something to be desired and sadly this might be why Ghanaians are treated poorly when working and underpaid, especially by foreigners.

Ghanaians are sharing a post that claims that Shatta Wale, a Ghananian aritst gained 1 million views on one of his TikTok Live sessions. However it was 1 million likes.

A TikTok user gains likes from viewers tapping on their phone screens. One can tap as much as possible, I've tapped and given over 500 likes to one account, you can tap as much as possible. One the top right hand corner, TikTok shows how many people are viewing the Live video at one time.

Sadly, several bloggers in Ghana had no idea what this means, when people tried to inform them they refused to remove the posts. This shows how difficult life is in Ghana.

People may think it's only about social media, its about comprehension, there is a severe lack of comprehension in Ghana. It is a direct affect of the horrible educational system in the country.

Several schools in Ghana have no books, for over 4-years most schools had no textbooks. The lack of reading materials, one wonders how to children learn to read, not only learn to read how can they learn anything without books?

Some classrooms in Ghana look like crime scenes, filthy, without even chairs, desks or washrooms. The government of Ghana has failed the citizens, funds put into education are not enough.

Over the more recent years the Ghana news reports that around 10 thousand teachers have left Ghana. Which leaves those who are less qualified to teach in the country. Teachers in Ghana are also poorly paid, unless they work for the costly international or private schools.

Misinformation in Ghana is much bigger than local bloggers too, it is affecting the political process as well. This is happening all over Africa, espcially West Africa.

Misinformation in Ghana fuelled by politicians and weakened legacy media

At a frank discussion on misinformation convened by Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) and partner, stakeholders take tough stance on political propaganda and regulation of social media platforms.

This statement was originally published on mfwa.org on 24 March 2023.

At end of the public forum on mis-disinformation in Ghana, media stakeholders highlighted three main drivers of the problem: political party propaganda, legacy media’s sacrifice of news accuracy for speed and the Ghana government’s regulation challenge.

Consequently, to arrest the problem, the main recommendations by participants were that stakeholders take action to stem these three main drivers. The forum also demanded more responsibility for information accuracy from big tech companies and App makers.

The forum which was held in Ghana’s capital, Accra, came off at the Alisa hotel on Wednesday, March 22, 2023, under the theme: Misinformation, Peace and Democratic Consolidation in Ghana. It was hosted by the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) in partnership with Ghana’s National Peace Council (NPC) and the country’s media regulator, the National Media Commission (NMC).

Chaired by Prof. S.K.B Asante, Omanhene of Asante Asokore and Board Member of the National Peace Council, it brought together stakeholders from government, political parties, the diplomatic community, academia and civil society. It had as keynote speaker, Mr George Sarpong, Executive Secretary of the NMC said the popular supposition that the internet is too broad to be regulated is a myth and that as has happened in countries like China and Rwanda.

Source Ifex.Org

Social media can make or break a democracy, Africa is struggling with misinformation and coups. There has to be something done on a higher level with these social media platforms.

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