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MaltaToday 4 June 2017

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12 JURGEN BALZAN THIS year's electoral campaign has seen political parties invest heavily in online campaigning, with Facebook being the main bat- tleground. However, the two mainstream parties also invested heavily in more traditional mediums such as TV and erected hundreds of billboards and plastered their ban- ners in every available space on the roads. Online campaigning is not a new phenomenon. In 2013, Labour blitzed the net with ads, videos and banners popping up all over the place. However, unlike 2013, the PN has upped the game and while four years ago the party was completely absent online, this year it gave La- bour a good run for its money and held a creative edge. For the first time in nine years Labour leader Joseph Muscat found himself in the uncharted waters of having to react instead of calling the shots himself. For most of the five-week campaign, the PN was dictating the agenda and La- bour was forced on a number of occasions to react. The sudden announcement of the snap election on 1 May might have caught the PN by surprise and it took the opposition a few days to get its campaign rolling. While Labour's billboards were erected a few hours after the an- nouncement it took the PN a few days to unfurl its banners and launch its logo. Although both parties, especially Labour, were election-ready, the logos left much to be desired, with the visuals appearing hasty and sterile. Admittedly Labour's campaign was not as slick and expensive as in 2013 but it still outstripped the PN's campaign in terms of bill- boards and newspaper adverts. The PN had some 65 billboards erected, a third of what Labour had. However, what the PN lacked in quantity was made up in quality, especially when compared to the moribund 2013 campaign. The PN's new found creativity and freshness shone throughout its billboards, TV spots and online campaign. Finally, thanks to Panamagate, the PN found a rallying cry and rallied behind the theme of cor- ruption, despite never providing conclusive evidence on the alleged ownership of a secret company in Panama by Muscat and his wife. The PN did however present evidence on the alleged corrup- tion involving Muscat's chief of staff, Keith Schembri, and minister Konrad Mizzi and this strength- ened the PN leader Simon Busut- til's resolve and allowed him to take the moral high ground. Panamagate served as a catalyst for the PN's renaissance with the party rediscovering its allure and once again became an electable party. The PN's headquarters in Pieta once again became a bee- hive of activity and according to party officials who spoke to this newspaper, the enthusiasm was so high the PN had to turn back vol- unteers. Having to defend its corner, La- bour had to play a balancing act between championing its impres- sive track record in civil liberties and economic management and fending off serious accusations of corruption. Labour's overall campaign main- ly targeted its core voters while trying to keep enough switchers within its ranks to maintain a com- fortable advantage over the PN. This was achieved by a combina- tion of an underlying message of continuity through TV spots and billboards highlighting its achieve- ments and proposals and a series of negative messages depicting the PN as a negative and fractious party. Labour held a steady lead in the polls as did Muscat in the trust rat- ings. This indicates that the PN's negative campaign, in which it tried to convey the message that Muscat was politically responsible for the alleged corruption, did not inflict enough damage. The PN's failure to close the gap in the polls is also down to its own shortcomings and Labour's own negative campaign, symbolised by its 'Chaos' billboard, which por- trayed Busuttil and the PN as un- prepared and incapable to govern. The digital duel The 2017 electoral campaign must go down as the first in which both Labour and the PN dedicated a huge chunk of their resources for online campaigning. A report on the social media ac- tivity of both parties carried out by technology company ICON shows that the PN had a slight edge in en- gaging with people on Facebook. The study shows that the PN was ahead of Labour in regard to social sentiment (calculated by dividing the number of likes by the number of posts made on Facebook), hav- ing almost a 20-point sentiment gap by the end of the campaign. ICON also carried out a qualita- tive analysis of both Joseph Mus- cat's and Simon Busuttil's Face- book pages to understand what kind of posts, uploads and messag- es, the two candidates promoted during the campaign. A quick glance at both pages, ICON said, reveals a very different method and style of communica- tion between the two leaders. Muscat's Facebook page has dou- ble the number of followers Busut- til has (80,000 vs 41,000), the PN leader's page saw a slightly larger increase in followers throughout the month of May. "The highest amount of engage- ment received in one day was ap- proximately 26,000 interactions on Joseph Muscat's and approxi- mately 20,000 interactions on Si- mon Busuttil's. Although more en- maltatoday, SUNDAY, 4 JUNE 2017 News QUOTA Name Party 1 2 3 GIARDINA Joseph AB _________________________ CASSAR Ralph AD _________________________ CALLEJA Anthony MPM _________________________ FERRIGGI Johann MPM _________________________ PISANI Alex MPM _________________________ AGIUS DECELIS Anthony [Tony] PL _________________________ AZZOPARDI Charles PL _________________________ BORG Ian PL _________________________ CASTALDI PARIS Ian PL _________________________ FARRUGIA PORTELLI Julia PL _________________________ GULIA Gavin PL _________________________ PULLICINO ORLANDO Jeffrey PL _________________________ SCHEMBRI Silvio PL _________________________ SCICLUNA Edward PL _________________________ ZRINZO AZZOPARDI Stefan PL _________________________ ABELA Sam PN _________________________ AGIUS Monique PN _________________________ BORG Antione PN _________________________ BORG Dounia PN _________________________ BUGEJA BARTOLO Lee PN _________________________ DEBONO Jean Pierre PN _________________________ FARRUGIA Godfrey PN _________________________ FENECH ADAMI Beppe PN _________________________ MAZZOLA Paul PN _________________________ MICALLEF Peter PN _________________________ VASSALLO David PN _________________________ VASSALLO Edwin PN _________________________ VASSALLO Ian Mario PN _________________________ Portelli, Marthese PN Pullicino, George PN Selvaggi, Charles PN Zammit Dimech, Francis PN Mercieca, Anthony IND * Non-Trans. * 7 Zebbug, Dingli, Imgarr, Imtarfa, Rabat, Bahrija, Tal- Virtù 8 Balzan, Birkirkara, Fleur de Lys, Swatar (part of), Iklin, Lija QUOTA Name Party 1 2 3 MALLIA Mario AD __________________________ ALOISIO Pascal AD __________________________ FARRUGIA RANDON Romina MPM __________________________ SAMMUT Guzeppi MPM __________________________ CARDONA Chris PL __________________________ CASTALDI PARIS Ian PL __________________________ CUTAJAR Rosianne PL __________________________ MUSCAT Alex PL __________________________ SCICLUNA Edward PL __________________________ TUA Rachel PL __________________________ ZAMMIT LEWIS Edward - PL __________________________ AGIUS David PN __________________________ ALDEN Timothy PN __________________________ ASCIAK Michael PN __________________________ BEZZINA Malcolm PN __________________________ BUGEJA BARTOLO Lee PN __________________________ BUTTIGIEG Claudette PN __________________________ COMODINI CACHIA Therese PN __________________________ FENECH ADAMI Beppe PN __________________________ GALEA Vincent [Censu] PN __________________________ MICALLEF Angelo PN __________________________ SCHEMBRI Giorgio Mario PN __________________________ SCHEMBRI Justin PN __________________________ SCIBERRAS Dorian PN __________________________ THAKE David PN __________________________ VELLA Norman PN __________________________ Campaign reaches new digital heights MZPN's 'Money Zombies' allows people to catapult Panama hats at zombie versions of Joseph Muscat, Michelle Muscat, Konrad Mizzi and Keith Schembri

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