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Social media chatter on Bersih 4 trumps past rallies, but no guarantee of attendance: Politweet

KUALA LUMPUR — While social media interest in Bersih 4 rally has topped previous protests by Bersih 2.0 in 2011 and 2012, researchers Politweet said it was no guarantee of attendance at tomorrow’s (Aug 29) demonstration.

Supporters chooses Bersih 4 T-shirts from Bersih 2.0's Petaling Jaya office. Support for Bersih 4 is prevalent among over 1,000 influential Malaysian Twitter users who talked about the rally, with three-quarters of them favouring the rally. Photo: Malay Mail Online

Supporters chooses Bersih 4 T-shirts from Bersih 2.0's Petaling Jaya office. Support for Bersih 4 is prevalent among over 1,000 influential Malaysian Twitter users who talked about the rally, with three-quarters of them favouring the rally. Photo: Malay Mail Online

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KUALA LUMPUR — While social media interest in Bersih 4 rally has topped previous protests by Bersih 2.0 in 2011 and 2012, researchers Politweet said it was no guarantee of attendance at tomorrow’s (Aug 29) demonstration.

According to Politweet, 27,012 Twitter users in total have tweeted about Bersih 4 between its July 8 launch date and Aug 27, with nearly 9,000 users talking about it yesterday after Malaysia’s Internet regulator announced it is blocking access to pro-Bersih 4 websites.

Despite that, Politweet said the numbers have not been high, compared to those tweeting on other current issues.

“In one month Bersih has drawn interest from 27,012 users on Twitter. For comparison, 58,962 users mentioned Mr Najib Razak in one day on July 28 following the Cabinet reshuffle and removal of Deputy Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin from the Cabinet,” the pollster said.

Politweet also said the amount of chatter on social media was not a good indicator of attendance at the overnight rally this weekend, organised by polls reform group Bersih 2.0 that is scheduled to last for 34 hours from 2pm tomorrow to 11.59pm on Sunday.

“During our analysis we noticed that only a few Twitter users were discussing staying overnight camping in the streets. Users attending the event only showed interest in staying in hotels. User discussions gave the impression they were treating it as a one-day event,” it said.

“Whether the number of participants can beat Bersih 3’s record is an open question. Attendance may peak between 2pm and 5pm on August 29 depending on whether police action takes place,” Politweet added.

Support for Bersih 4 however is prevalent among more than 1,000 influential Malaysian Twitter users who talked about the rally, with three-quarters of them favouring the rally. Roughly three out of ten even called for Prime Minister Najib to step down.

Among its sample of 1,358 Twitter users who tweeted about Bersih 4, Politweet said most of those who were perceived as pro-UMNO were instead anti-Najib, who expressed interest in joining the rally to call for the resignation of the prime minister and UMNO president.

Despite that, there were also some supporters of Bersih 4 who were wary of the involvement of the opposition in the rally and were against the opposition taking a more influential and leading role in the rally.

In addition, users who were against Bersih 4 also distrusted Bersih 2.0 and believed that the electoral watchdog had a hidden agenda or political influence, rejected street rallies, or did not support the organisers hijacking the Merdeka celebration.

Many users sampled were also offended by Mr Najib’s remark that Malays will be “terbangsat” — Malay for “bastardised” — without UMNO, with Politweet suggesting that the word may have been too extreme or that anti-Najib sentiment was currently very strong.

A separate analysis on the Facebook platform by Politweet showed that 610,000 users aged 13 and above in Malaysia are interested in Bersih 2.0, making up 3.39 per cent of 18 million, the total Malaysian population on Facebook.

Politweet said the majority of those with most interest in Bersih 2.0 are between 21 and 30 years old, which can be concluded to be university students and fresh graduates.

It also said that there has been an increase of interest among users from Kuala Lumpur, Selangor and Penang, but interest has dropped from East Malaysian states.

The overnight Bersih 4 rally will take place this weekend in Kuala Lumpur, Kuching in Sarawak, Kota Kinabalu in Sabah, and several other cities worldwide.

The five demands of the rally are clean elections; clean government; right to dissent; strengthening parliamentary democracy and saving the economy. MALAY MAIL ONLINE

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