The Youth, Social Media and Self-Mobilisation: The Motivating Factors During the 2023 Presidential Election in Abia State, Nigeria

There had been apathy in previous elections in Nigeria due to disbelief in the process. But it was noticed that the 2023 general elections witnessed a high level of voter registration and subsequent voter participation, especially among the youth. The principal aim of this study was to understand how social media influenced self-mobilisation efforts of the Nigerian youth for participation in the 2023 Presidential Election. This was achieved by examining the nature of social media content about the candidates and other factors that motivated the youth to engage in social action and promoted participation during the elections. This study adopted a mixed methods research design. Thus, a combination of survey and critical discourse analysis was used in this study to investigate the opinions of participants on the one hand and the contents of the social media self-mobilised messages on the other hand. In the end, it was found that the youth were motivated by several factors such as the need to change the political system, the zeal to remove the current ruling class, who are predominantly old people, and the quest to install young generation leaders. It was concluded that social media played the desired roles by enabling the projection of the self-mobilised messages that influenced youth participation in Nigeria’s 2023 presidential election. It is, therefore, recommended that politicians should work hard to individualise their political relevance to earn the solidarity of the citizens.