The phenomenal rise of new media, and their convergence with the traditional media, has led to a series of political events around the world between 2009-2012 and has lent credence to the traditional liberal theorists’ arguments around the democratic role of the media in modern society. Media scholars have argued that the media have a greater role to play, and that they even have greater responsibility in a democracy (Keane; 1991, McChesney and Nichols; 2010, Curran & Seaton; 2003, Murdock and Golding; 2005, Esipisu and Khaguli 2009:107, Chowdhury 2004). Voltmer and Rawnsley (2009) noted that the media is a dominant actor in political life across the world. The Internet and mobile telephony, supported by social networking media such as
Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, are believed to have played a major role in the political events in
the Northern part of Africa, generally referred to as the Arab Spring.
The ease and availability of these means of communication have allowed for increased public mobilisation and political activism since 2000. Examples abound of the growing influence of the media as an agent of political change. The 2009 anti-fraud protests in the Eastern European nation of Moldavia were organised by activists using Twitter. The Arab Spring of 2010-2011 witnessed the birth of a democratic government in Tunisia and a change of guard in Egypt, Yemen and Libya, while the on-going Syrian uprising is attracting international attention due to the power of the media, particularly the power of citizen journalism powered by social media.
Scholars have argued that the spate of protests induced regimes change across the North of the African region is due to the close relationship between the media and politics (Stokes 2008; Pintak 2011, Stack, 2009, Mudhai 2007). Pintak (2011) noted that the Arab Spring is one of the fallouts
Oluwasina Abidemi Babasola, University of Westminster (2017) 57 | P a g e
of the media revolution that started with the deregulation of the media sector in the region in 1997, and that the authoritarian governments could not stop it. He declared that the electronic dam had burst, and with it their ability to control the flow of information, along with crusading journalists and digitally armed activists, this facilitated the move towards the democratisation of the region. Countries in Sub-Saharan Africa have also experienced some level of democratic change, particularly in the last decade, with the increased role of the social media (Adejumobi, 2000: 2).
This study therefore shares Tettey’s (2001: 28) view that “the media and democracy are symbiotically related and so, mutually, reinforcing”. Gunther and Mughan (2000), Higgins (2008), Hallin and Mancini (2004), Chomsky (1989) and Esipisu and Khaguli (2009) have supported this line of argument. In his analysis, O’Neil (1998:1) and Ansah (1988: 13) have noted that a strong connection exists between mass communication and democracy. They argue that the media are viewed as a vital conduit of relations between state and society. Akinfeleye (2012) argued that the media is the lubricating oil for democracy, as well as the propeller of an active democratic government, the world over. Voltmer and Rawnsley (2009) contend that the media fulfils two main functions in democratic life: they provide a forum where all voices can be heard, and they engage in a dialogue with each other. This argument is in tandem with the theory of the public sphere postulated by Habermas (1989).
Kelly and Donway (1990) note that one important role of the media as the “watchdog of the society”. However, Berger (2002) has noted that since much of the African media has played a political propagandist role or a developmentalist role, its watchdog role is nothing to write home about.
The roles of the media in the wave of democratisation have also caught the attention of African scholars. Notable scholars, such as Eribo and Jong-Ebot (1997) and Hyden, Leslie and Ogundimu (2007), have provided empirical evidence linking media to democracy. Hyden, et al (2007: 1) note that communication shapes democratisation, but that the causal link between the two variables would be dependent on the extent to which political actors in the states allow freedom of expression, which would influence the behaviour of journalists.
Oluwasina Abidemi Babasola, University of Westminster (2017) 58 | P a g e
Hyden and Okigbo (2007) argued that the relationship between the media and democracy was not a linear one but one that is influenced by a number of intervening variables, e.g., the degree of state control, media representation of people’s interests in society and the media’s international connections. Making recourse to the past, they contend that the current wave of democratisation spreading on the continent is not the first attempt of African states to democratise.
According to them, the first attempt at democracy took place during the struggle for independence, with democracy as an integral part of the political agenda, and that the media were active participants (p.31). The first wave of democracy was at independence, but, this soon fizzled out with the military taking over the reins of government in the 1970s and 1980s.
Hyden and Okigbo, (2007) and Adebanwi and Obadare (2011) have described this period as a neo- patrimonial and hegemonic era (1960 to 1989) in which African leaders were co-opted into the formal institutions of state in order to serve personal needs. Bratton (2009) opined that a new wave of transition to multi-party rule began with the Namibian decolonisation in the 1990s, and it subsided only after Nigeria returned to civilian government in 1999.
This is the period Huntington (1991) termed the third wave of democratisation in Africa. It should be noted that Bratton did not refer to Nigeria as returning to democratic rule but to civilian government. Africans experienced a long period of colonial government between 1885 and 1960, and they barely partook in the second wave of democratisation that accompanied the break-up of Communist rule in Europe in the middle 20th century.
Scholars have argued that the current democratic rule in most African states was due to the mass political action of the 20th century, which started in the European colonial empires, the economic crises plaguing African states, the end of the Cold War, and pressure from domestic civil society groups (Bratton, 1994, 2009, Huntington 1991, Haynes 1997, Maathai 2009). Thomson (2000: 217-220) wrote that what was taking place in Africa was the second liberation of the continent and they attributed the wave of democratisation to four factors. These are the state’s loss of authority occasioned by economic crisis, a new international political environment, the rejuvenation of civil
Oluwasina Abidemi Babasola, University of Westminster (2017) 59 | P a g e
society, and precedents such as the election of Nelson Mandela as president and the dismantling of apartheid in South Africa, all of which were responsible for the culture of multi-party politics in Africa.
Haynes (1997:77) provided a better scenario relating to the intervening variables that have facilitated the current democratic rule in Africa:
Collectively, the demonstration effects provided by developments in Southern and Eastern Europe served as a catalyst for the later generation of calls for enhanced human rights and, by extension, greater democracy in the Third World.
At this juncture, critical remarks are inevitable: This research will attempt to validate the assumption that the street protests might not lead to truly democratic government, as recent developments in Egypt that pertain to the presidential election have revealed. The results of the electoral processes do not move in tandem with the aspirations of those who planned the series of protests that forced Hosni Mubarak out of government after 33 years in office. Second, it is the contention of this study that the waves of democratisation may not have brought the much anticipated dividend that was expected by scores of Africans in the last one and half decades of democracy on the continent. Indeed, this study intends to investigate the extent to which democracy and free Press had helped the cause of anti-corruption in Nigeria. Going by the verdicts of Neild (2002: 13), “the introduction of democracy that is commonly said, nowadays, to be a way of suppressing corruption may be far from the truth, as history from France, Germany and the United States point to the fact that democracy may result in more corruption”. He cautioned that there was a need to keep an open mind on the relationship between democracy and clean government.