Whatever movement in Nigeria has been on the street has been the power of social media lending their voice in the plight of the Nigerian citizen against the police brutality.
The #Endsars, has stayed as the number 1 list in many countries Twitter trend, kicking off not only awareness in the international recognised media outlet like Reuter, Aljazeera, B B C, and CNN but also report live all forms of organised protests in many part in Nigeria and world abroad even if our local station or journalists couldn’t report the news the way the media reported it.
As the world is gradually aligning itself towards the Hashtag ENDSARZ trend, we are beginning to see that Hashtag “#” has become the most effective tool in this century.
Either Instagram, Twitter and Facebook, Hashtags is one way of joining the trend or knowing burning issues that concerns us; objectively, it is an opportunity to promote or push your agenda to the world; businesses to people; participate in happenings and opinions that matters to the society. It has successfully been the most effective way of weighing opinion polls, it has by its own dynamic taken a quick coup to the TV channels and news outlets as a mean of information to people fingertips.
Moreover, while democracy tools like referendum are mostly physical to decide on the things that matters making it more bureaucratic and slow by it consequence; Just know at the corners of your rooms that with an # you could be the burner that burns not run.
Introverted or Extroverted, exposure to pop culture can be garnered from the hashtag trends, the consequences of it is that even if you’re not on a platform that uses Hastags, you could see the influence on the Whatsapp status on your Contact list through the content they give.
Talking about the influence of the Hashtags will be almost like a repetition since there a lot of us has been enlightened by it. The cogent matter of this article is an epiphany that hashtag is the key in any reform for anything you want in the world to be changed or voice to be heard without threat from external factors except you live in a country that it internet has been controlled then I do not assure you of safety.
To my surprise as a Nigerian, the football friendly match between Nigeria and Algeria didn’t really matter or the Ondo state elections mattered even if it is a key issue to our democracy but instead, the only democracy we are saying is #ENDSARZ in today’s concerns. And that is a development for democracy.
As the #blacklivesmatter took to an effect by the kneeling down or the Rape # provoked the sexual harassment bill into the country, i hope the hashtags for the ENDSARZ takes an Effect then “#” hashtags will be the democracy we all trust.
- SOWEMIMO HAMID