Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) 2018 Election’s Campaign Analysis
Introduction
In the past, traditional media such as radio, newspapers and television played a greater role in providing the public with sufficient information to make an informed decision on choosing their candidate. In addition, such forms of media were also used by the candidate to transmit their message and political ideology to the public. However, with the arrival of the internet and social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, instagram etc the process of political communication has undergone significant change in both developed and developing economies. In order to further analyze how political communication has evolved in developing countries such as Pakistan, I will be focusing on the campaign of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) for the elections held in Pakistan on 25 July, 2018. Initially, I will be exploring and comparing the communication strategy of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) with its two biggest opponents i.e. the Pakistan Muslim League (N) and Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP). Then I will analyze the overall efficacy of the PTI campaign, discussing whether their strategy was a success or not.
Literature Review
Social media and especially the use of social media websites such as Twitter and Facebook have become widely popular in Pakistan, particularly amongst the younger population. According to Iqbal A (2018) the youth forms about 64% of the total Pakistani population and websites like Facebook and Twitter have become a part of the daily lives. This is because individuals use such websites to keep themselves up to date with current affairs and in order to make informed decisions. Therefore, according to Zulqarnain & Hassan (2017), political candidates view the social media as a source of gaining access to the public and transmitting information and their ideology. Traditional media is becoming less important for promoting political agendas because people no longer use such forms of media to gain information and make decisions.
At the time of the 2018 elections in Pakistan, the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) stated that about 58 million people had access to the internet and were actively involved in using social media services. The 2018 elections witnessed a new wave because this was the first time where traditional media was replaced by large scale involvement of social media. In addition, interestingly, social media was being used by both liberal and religious political parties to further their views. Earlier, it could not have been imagined that instead of resorting to traditional means of campaign, religious political parties in Pakistan would make use of such social media platforms in the elections of 2018. In addition, according to Rehman,et al. (2013), in Pakistani politics social media is empowering citizens in many ways. It helps in shaping opinions of the public and learning about what others think about a certain candidate. People hence express themselves on these platforms and regulate their opinions for political purposes to influence the public.
A research was conducted by Agha (2009), on the “influence of social networking sites on youth”. The aim of the research was to understand whether social media could potentially divert the youth from socializing in the real world. It was actually found by the researcher that social media and social networking sites have become a major part of the daily lives of the youngsters. Social media actually helps youth to interact with their environment, socialize with others and express themselves freely.
Overview of primary themes, styles and communication strategies employed by PTI
In the 2018 elections PTI campaigned with the help of both paid and earned media. Paid strategies included the usage of facebook advertisements, newspapers coverage, television coverage, television commercials and the transmission of audio messages in the voice of Imran Khan in the forms of calls. Such calls were possible with the help of the mobile network services. In addition, PTI also hired famous singers in Pakistan to compose party songs.Their campaign was also publicized through earned media such as Twitter, Facebook, hashtags, videos circulation on WhatsApp, news channels, dharnas (demonstrations), speeches etc. For instance, in PTI dharnas (demonstrations)and speeches organized for the campaign there were no costs borne by the campaign for its dissemination. Instead there was free coverage given by the newspapers and television channels because of the massive gatherings.
Dharans and speeches by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s chairman is considered to be one of the most charming personalities. Due to this reason Imran khan was able to lead massive scale dharnas in the country between 2014 and early 2017 where he was able to gather thousands of people, both men and women, at a common place: D-chowk, Islamabad. According to Wikipedia, Dharna is defined as “a non-violent sit-in protest, which may include fast undertaken at the door of an offender, especially a debtor, in India as a means of obtaining compliance with a demand for justice, state response of criminal cases, or payment of a debt” (Wikipedia). These dharnas led by Imran Khan were very successful because of his power to engage the crowd and also due to his fair demands from the government to get resignation of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif who was a corrupt leader. The people were not asked to stay at the site daily; instead supporters still gathered daily in the evening after finishing off with their daily chores. There they used to hear the fiery speeches delivered by the PTI leaders and party members. After the resignation was given by the Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, the Dharnas ended.
Then, during the election campaign, Imran Khan revived the concept of dharnas through large gatherings. The Dharnas can be considered as a source of success for the PTI party because through the large number of people who gathered at these dharnas, the masses were able to see the strength of the party. This meant that even if a person was not a supporter of PTI, he or she was able to view the strength of the party and the high chance of them winning the election through the television coverage. The coverage of the dharnas meant that PTI’s political ideologies were communicated and that then helped people to make a decision. It also resulted in some people changing their decisions and supporting PTI.
The television channels provided extensive coverage for these large gatherings organized by PTI. At times news reporters covered the public who had joined the gatherings as well. The women who were a part of these gatherings were from educated class, middle aged and dressed up in an attractive manner. In addition, they also wore the clothes made of the flag color of PTI or wore shirts which had the logo or picture of the chairman prinited. Such coverage enabled PTI to draw attention and penetrate into the masses further. These gatherings were also considered by the women as a safe place for expression. This further inspired other women to join these demonstrations and the political party. The party promised equal rights for women and this was indicated in PTI gatherings where women were able to express themselves in the public space just as men did. The party’s positive image allowed PTI to increase its voter base to include women.
Audio messages by Imran Khan
PTI also used the strategy of using audio messages which were communicated through regular calls. People would receive these calls and would hear an audio message in the voice of Imran Khan saying, “Assalamu Alaikum, I am Imran Khan, I want to say an important message to you…” (Imran Khan). Listening to a message in the voice of Imran Khan was very appealing to the audience. This is because it felt like having a direct chat with the chairman of PTI who made them understand the political manifesto of the party and also explained why the political party was better than its opponents who had come into power a couple of times historically since the formation of the country.
PTI Party Songs
Party songs have become a very important part of Pakistani political campaigns and are used to promote party manifestos. In the 2018 elections, however, party songs and slogans played an even more important role than before because they became very appealing to youngsters and middle aged people. A young supporter of Pakistan Tehreek-i- Insaf named Amina Khizer, said that “ Conveying messages through genre of songs influences the people more instead of boring speeches of the political personalities”.(The Express Tribune, 2020). For the 2018 elections, PTI got its party songs sung by the notable singers of Pakistan such as Rahat Fateh Ali Khan, Farhan Saeed, Sahir Ali Bagga, Nazeer Chohan etc. These singers were effectively able to compose and sing songs to mobilize the crowd. This also allowed PTI to communicate its message to the target audience in an attractive way. Moreover, these songs were also uploaded on the official website of PTI and video streaming websites like Youtube and Vimeo. Millions of views and shares were given to these songs on different platforms such as Facebook, WhatsApp, Youtube, Twitter etc, allowing PTI to connect with millions of Pakistani people.
These party songs were also a major factor contributing to the success of PTI in the 2018 elections. This is because they helped in disseminating the message and charging the crowd.
Imagined voter base or constituency of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)
The imagined voter base of PTI is the youth and middle aged people of Pakistan. The campaign of PTI has been very successful because it has been able to target the right audience through usage of the right medium such as social media platforms (e.g. Facebook and Twitter). Many youngsters and middle aged people voted for Imran Khan in the hopes of having a changed Pakistan. The demographics of his voters show that the majority of his votes came from educated individuals living in the urban areas. People voted for him because of his revolutionary rhetoric on bringing a fair and free type of government which would be corruption free. Reforms in the sectors of health, education, defense etc were also promised. In addition, many women voted for Imran Khan as well because they found his gatherings as a safe place where they could stand equal to men without fear of being molested or harassed. They hoped that these gatherings gave an indication of a country where women would receive their rights and would notbe discriminated against. Other women saw positive interviews given by the women on television who attended these gatherings or in other words known as “jalsas” and were impressed by what these gatherings portrayed.
Social media analysis of 3 major political parties of Pakistan: PTI, PML(N) and PPP
In this section, I will be comparing the social media strategies of the three major political parties of Pakistan. This will be done through looking at their social media accounts focusing on their likes, followers, posts etc. Using this I will be analyzing whether social media presence and following on a politician’s or party’s official accounts signify the publicity of their candidate and the political party itself. We will look at the table below and use it to answer one of the fundamental questions: “Does the following on the social media show that the political party is stronger and has higher chances of being successful in the following elections?”
According to Table 1, Imran Khan who is the chairman of PTI had 10.2 million followers before the 2018 elections in Pakistan. The President of the PML-(N) party, Mian Shahbaz Sharif had 4.5 million followers. Finally, the Chairman of PPP, Bilwal Butto the son of late PM of Pakistan, Benazir Bhutto had 3.5 million followers. This made PPP the least followed party on Twitter, followed by PML-(N) and PTI being the most followed party on Twitter.
According to Table 2, before the 2018 elections, the official page of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf had the highest number of likes on its official fan page. It also had the highest number of posts with posts made by the official page tallying at nine hundred and thirty eight. PML (N) had 2.9 million likes on its official facebook page which were second highest, with seven hundred and ninety seven posts made by the official page. Finally, Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) social media page had only 300,857 likes on the facebook page and the total number of posts made before the election were five hundred and thirty four.
Since PTI won the 2018 election, closely followed by PML-(N) it can be said that the above information indicates that social media following does have a big impact on the election results. Hellweg (2011), also conducted a study on social media and confirmed that when the social media such as Twitter and Facebook are used effectively then a positive relationship between both the public and the candidates is developed, which could potentially help a candidate win a political battle.
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf ran the election campaign on Twitter and Facebook through popularising multiple hashtags, #PTIrulesKP, #WazireAzamImranKhan (PM Imran Khan), #AbSirfImranKhan(Only Imran Khan) #NawazSharifChor (Nawaz Sharif theif) etc in order to reach millions of people. However on the other hand, PTI’s main opponent PMLN used a smaller number of hashtags, mainly #VoteKoIzzatDo (Respect people’s opinion through vote). PTI’s second major opponent PPP mainly used the hashtag #TharBadlayGaPakistan (Thar will change Pakistan). These hashtags were mainly used by these political parties as a way to target new people and also show others that their political party is popular and has support amongst the masses.
In addition, as part of their political campaigns, the political parties also highlighted works done by them in their previous tenures in the government. For example, PTI showed the works done in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa where they formed government in the 2013 elections. PTI showed the development they brought about in their tenure in unique ways. They used trucks decorated in truck art to display big screens which showed the performance of PTI to the public as part of the election campaigns. Sound systems were also placed in movable trucks to engage the interest of the audience so they would be incentivized to view the videos. PML(N) also made use of videoclippings and video messages with their party’s hashtag in order to engage with people. In the same way also PPP made use of both audio and video messages with hashtags in order to counter the manifestos of PTI and PML(N). Through these messages they were able to indicate that they would be able to fulfill promises made by the Party’s previous leader i.e. Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto(Late) and Benazir Bhutto (Late) .
As discussed above, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf had both the highest number of followers on Twitter and Facebook and was able to use effective media strategies to approach people. Their strong media presence and execution of the media strategy led to success of PTI in the 2018 elections.
Table 3 above shows the newspaper coverage of the 3 leading political parties of Pakistan by the 4 major newspapers of Pakistan. According to the table above, Dawn News covered 46.7% news of the PML(N) campaign, 20.9% of PPP and 32.3% of PTI. This shows that it gave the maximum coverage to the PML(N) political party which won the second highest seats in the 2018 elections and the second priority was given to PTI which won the elections in 2018. The News newspaper covered 60.9% of PML(N) campaign, 12.1% of PPP and 26.8% of PTI campaign. This shows that again another significant newspaper of Pakistan gave most coverage to PML(N). Second priority was given to PTI. Jang Newspaper covered 54.5% of PML(N) campaign, 25% of PPP and 20.4% of PTI’s campaign. This shows that even the third leading newspaper of Pakistan covered PMLN the most and actually gave second priority to PPP which won the least votes amongst the three political parties. Finally, the fourth major newspaper of Pakistan named Nawaiwaqt covered 69.8% of PML(N)’s campaign , 15.8% of PPP’s campaign and 14.2% of PTI’s campaign. Thus, again giving maximum preference to PMLN’s campaign coverage
The above analysis shows that in terms of newspapers priority was given to PML(N) in their coverage. However, it is noted that even though PML(N) was given the most preference in terms of newspaper coverage it was not victorious in the 2018 elections. This shows that in these elections traditional media coverage such as newspapers was not of appeal and did not play a major role in deciding the election’s fate. This is because the voter base consisted of the youth who do not actually engage with these traditional forms of media e.g. newspapers. Thus coverage by newspapers did not influence the voter base or played a role in changing the attitude of the target voting population. Instead, the traditional media’s appeal was overshadowed by social media influence through Twitter and Facebook. The opinion of the voter’s was actually reshaped through social media. The 2018 elections prove that traditional forms of media to influence and get connected with the population have been replaced through social media presence of political parties.
Conclusion
As seen above, it is clear that social media did play a major role in the 2018 elections of Pakistan. Social media is integral because the voting age in Pakistan starts from 18 years and more than 64% of the population of Pakistan is under 30. This shows it is very important to appeal to them in order to be successful in the elections. To win their support it is best to promote a political party on social media as most of the young individuals under the age of 30 use social media platforms on a regular basis. Finally, it is also noted that in the 2018 elections social media helped the political parties to keep up to date with information and deal with problems on a timely basis. Social media allowed them to solve problems at the earliest through the two way communication that exists on these platforms with the public. It is a cost effective way to communicate with a large number of people and for disseminating the party manifesto amongst the people. Hence, showing that social media has become a need for politics nowadays.
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