OPINION
Converting tweets into feet : can Zimbabwe ’ s social media activism oust Robert Mugabe ?
By Ciara McCorley
Ciara McCorley Research Fellow , African development and democracy , University of Sussex
Protests coordinated on social media have emerged in recent weeks throughout the country addressing national issues
Protests against the rule of Zimbabwe ’ s ageing president , Robert Mugabe , have become commonplace in recent months . In one of the latest incidents on August 24 , police used tear gas and water cannons to disperse a “ Mugabe Must Go ” protest in the capital Harare .
In April , Evan Mawarire , an unknown pastor , inadvertently started a wave of online activism when he started the # ThisFlag movement in a pleading Facebook post . Within hours , copycats had appeared online and the ZANU-PF regime found itself party to an upsurge in online and offline criticism .
Since then social media activism in Zimbabwe has ignited . WhatsApp , a mobile messaging service that is frequently subscribed to in a prepaid form in Zimbabwe , has been widely used as a tool to mobilise . It accounts for 34 % of all mobile data use in Zimbabwe . Facebook reports 260,000 daily users , of 890,000 Zimbabweans online , but this only accounts for 3 % of mobile broadband usage in the country . Newsday Zimbabwe , an independent news outlet , increased its
16 Business Times Africa | 2016