Last night was a spectacle in Uganda’s political history. For the first time in History all eight Presidential candidates appeared on one platform and discussed the issues that affect Ugandans and how they will tackle them once voted into power. Apart from the president finally making an appearance after he skipped the first presidential debate and Mr Mabirizi making the final exist just like “a real president”, the night was quite dramatic, thrilling and I must say entertaining, as Ugandans keenly followed the second presidential debate. So how did the event trend of social media? Despite having fewer Ugandans on Twitter compared to Facebook, the hashtag #UGDebates16 reached a peak on twitter and trended the fourth worldwide.
The beauty about twitter is that everyone has an opinion and the best or most rib cracking ones are re-tweeted and liked. Wondering which candidate stole the most limelight? Who was there as a class clown? Who was more critical on the issues at hand? Did Ugandans believe the candidates promises? Compared to the first debate, this debate saw more reach and impressions on twitter at about 380,000 and 426,000 this was a 55% and 48% increase respectively.
You can check out how Ugandans followed the second ever presidential debate on twitter using the hashtag #UGDebates16
1. The maximum number of posts on twitter were at 9pm.
2. More original tweets compared to retweets
3. Who posted the most tweets?
4. These where the most Influential Ugandans on Twitter during the debate
5. As expected the most #UGDebate16 twitter traffic was from Uganda (80%) followed by Kenya (4%) and USA (2%)
6. The Demographics
7. Twitter on Android dominated the night
8. Trending topics
