This post is an update of March 2013’s list of African leaders with a Facebook presence. All percentage changes represent growth over an 8-month period.

Interest in Facebook pages of African heads of state continues to grow as more Africans get online and as more Diasporans get involved with their communities back home. Presidential elections also drive social media activity. Since March 2013, the 7-month median page growth rate for Facebook “Likes” for African heads of state (presidents, PMs, etc.) stands at 28%. This is down slightly from the previous period of observation but is still very strong. At present, a typical African leader (a gross generalization) has 8,200 Facebook fans – up from less than 5,000 in July 2012. Still, very few leaders have an official Facebook presence – most pages are unofficial or are simply “community pages” generated from Wikipedia content. Not much has changed in this regard in the past year. Still, these pages are misleading – their information is not official and the voice is not that of the actual leader – yet thousands of African Facebook users like them as a sign of interest or support. Many nations are starting to remove these fake pages, even if the head of state has no official page in the works.

Three Africans nations have a new leader since our March 2013 update. Central African Republic has a new president in Michel Djotodia after Francois Bozize fled the country. In Egypt, Mohammed Morsi is no longer in power; instead Adly Mansour is acting President of Egypt. Ibrahim Keita successfully won Mali’s presidency in mid-2013 elections.

Roughly a dozen African leaders currently have an official Facebook page (most are still unofficial or fan-run). Maybe a couple have added one in the past fifteen months. Some governments are starting to control their brand by removing fake pages for leaders. Still, the typical African head of state now has over 8,000 Facebook Likes and is gaining about 150 new ones per month. Unfortunately, new leaders too often lack an online presence (look at Egypt, Libya, or Somalia) despite the opportunity to build trust using social media.

For a leader, a widely-followed page could represent:

1. Ability to utilize social media
2. General involvement with citizens
3. Efficacy
4. Media attention
5. Campaigning ability

The number of Facebook Likes also tends to mirror the availability of Internet access within a country. Of course, many “Likes” come from citizens living abroad, or simply those with international interests.

Growth trends & countries of interest:

• Median “Like” growth rate has increased to 28% (the 2nd highest equivalent monthly growth rate in the past three years).
• The median number of Likes for a leader has grown from 7,300 to 8,200, but ranges greatly from a few (Mauritania) to more than a million (Nigeria).
• The only negative growth was seen for Seychelle’s James Michel (and it was slight).
• Less than 5% growth in Algeria, Djibouti, Morocco, Seychelles.
• Absolute numbers of fans continue to be under 1,000 in Central African Republic, Guinea-Bissau, Libya, Mauritania, and Somalia. (plus most island nations).
• Unusually rapid growth given volume was noted for Burundi (from 400 to 1,900), Cape Verde (100 to 2,600), Comoros (100 to 450), Equatorial Guinea (200 to 2,200), Namibia (3,000 to 12,700), Sao Tome (20 to 400), Somalia (30 to 200), and Sudan (400 to 1,700). The reasons behind the change in interest is not entirely clear.
• Egypt’s acting president only has a community page with 54 fans; Morsi still has a page with 2.47 million Likes!
• There’s still no sign how Gabon’s Ali Bongo has over 127,000 likes or how Niger’s Mahamadou Issoufou has a page with 68,000 (neither page seems official). Both nations have extremely low internet access and relatively small groups living abroad. There’s a chance some of these likes were bought, yet neither page seems officially managed by the government.
• Uhuru Kenyatta gained another 230,000 likes (50% growth) since March following his election.
• Madagascar’s current president Andry Rajoelina gained an additional 3,000 likes for a community page due to an election period (he is not running, however).
• Nigeria’s Goodluck Jonathan continues to gain roughly 30,000 likes per month.
• South Africa’s Jacob Zuma still does not have an official Facebook presence. Nor do relatively new leaders from Egypt, Libya, or Somalia.
• Mali is a great example of a country with a new leader with a strong Facebook following. He has 63,500 likes – well more than his predecessor Dioncounda Traoré.
• A fake (yet popular) page for Uganda’s Yoweri Museveni was removed. It had 13,000 likes. Similarly, a misleading page for Cote d’Ivoire’s Alassane Ouattara was deleted.
• Zimbabwe’s PM Morgan Tsvangirai now has a slight lead on fan base compared to President Mugabe (124k to 122k).
• In order of sheer fanbase, Egypt now ranks #1 in Africa: Nigeria (1.1mm), Kenya (700k), Zimbabwe (124k), Gabon (128k), Morocco (88k).

The list as of October 27, 2013:

Country	President (or other title)	Facebook Page Type (hyperlinked)	October 2013 # of Likes	% Change since March 2013
Algeria	Abdelaziz Bouteflika	Official Page	25893	1%
Angola	Jose Dos Santos	Open Group	12711	21%
Benin	Thomas Yayi Boni	Official Page	8385	7%
Botswana	Seretse Khama Ian Khama	Unofficial Page	38565	14%
Burkina Faso	Blaise Compaoré	Unofficial Page	28054	48%
Burundi	Pierre Nkurunziza	Community Page	1903	347%
Cameroon	Biya Paul	Official Page	25944	11%
Cape Verde	Pedro Pires	Community Page	2636	2387%
Central African Republic	Michel Djotodia	Community Page	123	n/a
Chad	Lt Gen. Idriss Deby	Public Profile 2	1231	28%
Comoros	Ahmed Abdallah Sambi	Community Page	441	355%
Congo, Republic of	Denis Sassou-Nguesso	Official Page	9783	9%
Congo, Democratic Republic of	Joseph Kabila	Unofficial Page	13730	54%
Cote d'Ivoire	Alassane Ouattara	Official Page?	6822	-32%
Djibouti	Ismail Omar Guelleh	Unofficial Page?	5538	4%
Egypt	Adly Mansour	Community Page	54	n/a
Equatorial Guinea	Brig. Gen. (ret) Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo	Community Page	2232	1154%
Eritrea	Isaias Afeworki	Unofficial Page	12516	7%
Ethiopia	Hailemariam Desalegn (PM))	Unofficial Page	8951	45%
Gabon	Ali Bongo Ondimba	Official Page	127522	61%
The Gambia	Yahya Jammeh	Unofficial Page	7960	9%
Ghana	John Mahama	Unofficial Page	20329	12%
Guinea	Sékouba Konaté	Unofficial Page	4436	6%
Guinea-Bissau	Manuel Serifo Nhamadjo	Unofficial Page	264	43%
Kenya	Uhuru Kenyatta	Official Page	696105	50%
Lesotho	King Letsie III (King)	Unofficial Page	9735	44%
Liberia	Ellen Sirleaf Johnson	Community Page	7809	28%
Libya	Ali Zeidan (PM)	Community Page	143	93%
Madagascar	Andry Rajoelina	Community Page	3447	852%
Malawi	Joyce Banda	Community Page | Official Page	3652 / 454048	94%
Mali	Ibrahim Keita	Official Page	63499	n/a
Mauritania	Ba Mamadou Mbaré	Community Page	34	1033%
Mauritius	Sir Anerood Jugnauth	Unofficial Page	1514	16%
Morocco	King Mohamed VI (King)	Unofficial Page	88526	0%
Mozambique	Armando Emilio Guebuza	Official Page?	11681	25%
Namibia	Hifikepunye Pohamba	Community Page	12783	309%
Niger	Mahamadou Issoufou	Official Page	67903	154%
Nigeria	Dr. Goodluck Jonathan	Official Page	1117946	22%
Rwanda	Paul Kagame	Unofficial Page	30509	11%
Sao Tome & Principe	Fradique De Menezes	Community Page	383	1815%
Senegal	Macky Sall	Official Page	43330	37%
Seychelles	James Michel	Public Profile	4909	-2%
Sierra Leone	Ernest Bai Koroma	Community Page	10750	17%
Somalia	Hassan Sheikh Mohamoud	Community Page	201	593%
South Africa	Jacob Gedleyihlekisa Zuma	Community Page	34619	112%
South Sudan	Salva Kiir Mayardit	Community Page	3257	69%
Sudan	Omar Hassan al-Bashir	Community Page	1731	373%
Swaziland	King Mswati III (King)	Community Page	3248	110%
Tanzania	Jakaya Kikwete	Official Page	71432	19%
Togo	Faure Gnassingbe	"Fan Club"	6792	18%
Tunisia	Moncef Marzouki	Unofficial Page	2710	6%
Uganda	Lt. Gen. Yoweri Kaguta Museveni	Community Page	7653	-39%
Zambia	Michael Sata	Unofficial Page	3584	11%
Zimbabwe	Robert Gabriel Mugabe	Community Page	121718	27%
Zimbabwe	Morgan Tsvangirai (PM)	Official Page	124095	51%

Note: The above table lists all top African heads of state (usually President or PM) and provides a link to the most popular Facebook page, group, or profile for a given leader. The final column shows how many users “Like” (are interested in) the particular leader. In many cases a best guess has been used to determine the owner of a page.

Stats from July 2010, December 2010, March 2011, June 2011, October 2011, February 2012, July 2012, and March 2013 are also available.