2013 best blogger in Ghana talks

.... plus and minus of social media future in Africa

By Oral Ofori

Jemila Abdulai is the founder and

writer of Circumspecte.com and a consultant at the African Center for

Economic Transformation in Accra, Ghana. She is very passionate about

Africa as I came to discover in my recent talk with her about social media

and its effects on the youths of Africa during which she made a passionate

call on political leadership on the continent to be more involved with

youths and carve out workable policies to make ICT more practical.

Miss Abdulai sees herself as a Creative problem solver with an analytical

mind and a multicultural perspective. She also comes across as very

passionate about media, communications, women, youth, and African

development. In the first quarter of 2013 she was adjudged the best blogger

in the category of citizen journalism and news in Ghana by Blogging

Ghana,

the official mouthpiece for bloggers of Ghanaian origin in the world.

*Click to hear Jemila Abdulai talk to this blog via

SoundCloud

*

My conversation whith Jemila lasted almost half an hour within which she

talked a bit about the first ever bilingual Google+ hangout organized under

the auspices of Blogging Ghana and moderated by

her.

The English and French speaking hangout highlighted experiences and lessons

of the various social media campaigns for elections in West Africa with

participants coming from Ghana, Senegal and Nigeria.

While praising social media for the power it has to bridge information gaps

and bring people together all cross the world, Jemila felt most of Africa

was far behind the ICT curve. The lack of constant or at least regular

supply of electricity and Internet connectivity was not helping the

situation as well.

Social media, like anything else has its associated negatives. Some of the

major ones that would negatively impact on countries in Africa as more

people become users of this technology include infrastructural constraints

(little or no access to electricity, computers and or Internet

connectivity), lack of skills required to maximize social media usage

beneficially and credibility of information obtained from social media

enthusiasts and websites. The problem of identity theft and child

pornography were also concerns that came up in my chat with Jemila.

As she prepares towards finishing up a Masters of Arts in International

Economics and International Affairs with the Johns Hopkins University Paul

H. Nitz School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) in Washington DC.

The well travelled Ghanaian blogger in an answer to my question of what she

was doing to positively impact Africa and the world told me that she plans on

reinventing her blog as a start.

On her new site, bloggers will have the opportunity of being guest featured

as she plans to also put together a communications consultancy that offers

basic services to help people improve upon their writing and basic

communication skills and strategizing, as a way of giving back to society.

Get all the download from the horse's own mouth by clicking this link to

listen to our conversation

now

and

watch out for more about this prolific Ghanaian woman.

Oral Ofori, +1202-706-9881, oralofori@gmail.com, Freelance Journalist:

http://www.oralofori.com/ Wikimedia Ghana Enthusiast, Broadcaster, Retail

Specialist, Music Promoter, Artiste. http://about.me/oralofori/