It might be too soon to look to the period after the May 9, 2022 elections but the risk of polarization after the polls is high.
This polarization between those who voted and those who did not vote for the winner could result in heightened tensions and such a scenario should be considered so early measures can be taken.
Look at the massive disinformation that is happening online. You would be mistaken to think that it is all noise and not serious. This surge in disinformation can lead to polarization that can turn threatening.
The number of violent incidents related to the coming elections may be lower compared to the violence in past exercises but it doesn’t mean the situation could not turn worse. Even Vice President Leni Robredo said the biggest challenge to her presidential campaign is how to fight false information. It’s not about harassment or vote-buying. For Robredo, the surge in social media posts that spread disinformation is the most demanding. She said access to correct information will allow the public to fully understand the facts to help them decide who will lead them in the next six years.
It is understandable for Robredo to feel this way because, as Tsek.ph said, she is the “biggest victim” of disinformation on social media, while her rival, former senator and the dictator’s son Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr., is the beneficiary of positive but misleading messaging on social media.
Tsek.ph is an academe-based fact-checking initiative of VERA Files and 21 academic, media, and civil society institutions to fight disinformation and provide the public with verified information.
Marcos, for his part, has insisted his camp does not deploy troll farms and that he has not resorted to historical revisionism about his father’s dictatorial rule.
The posts attributed to disinformation networks appear to benefit the Marcoses, primarily to whitewash the abuses and corruption during his father’s martial law regime.
“Disinformation,” according to Unesco’s “Handbook for Journalism Education and Training”, is information that is false, and the person disseminating it knows it is false. “Misinformation,” on the other hand, is information that is false, but the person who is disseminating it believes it is true.
The disinformation campaign might seem harmless but it is not. Just because it happens in the virtual world or online doesn’t mean it cannot have real-life repercussions. On the contrary, when disinformation leads to polarization where people take opposing sides, that divide can get serious and threatening.
With the heated exchanges and heightened activity on social media, expect the polarization to increase after May 9.
This early, we need to promote the message that democracy is about an exchange of views and, once the vote is counted in a clean and honest manner, we need to respect the results and support whoever gets elected in the way that we can.