Bosnia's Politicians Remain Shy of Social Media

Bosnia's politicians should be more aware of the benefits and power that use of social media can bring - and many of them are making a mistake by not using this direct form of communication with the public, analysts say.

"It seems that most of the opposition politicians are present on the social media while those who run the country do not use it - as if they are forgetting that they should be in touch with citizens after elections," Ivana Maric, a political analyst in Sarajevo, told BIRN.

Analysis of the official accounts of political parties in Bosnia and of data collected from their Facebook pages or Twitter accounts show Bosnians mostly follow those in opposition, rather than those in government.

The opposition Democratic Front, DF, for example, has 56,000 likes on its Facebook page, followed by the main opposition Social Democratic Party, SDP, which has 53,000, while the main Bosniak party, the Party of Democratic Action, SDA, has 22,000.

The governing party in Bosnia's Serb-dominated entity, Republika Srpska, the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats SNSD, has the same number of likes as the SDA. The main Bosnian Croat party, the Croatian Democratic Union, HDZ, has far less, at 8,400.

Senad Sepic, from the Independent Bloc, Emir Suljagic, from the Civil Union of Bosnia and Denis Becirovic, from the SDP, are among most popular politicians on Facebook in Bosnia.

Those most followed on Twitter are Damir Masic, an MP in the state-level parliament, followed by 7,471 people, his party colleague in parliament, Sasa Magazinovic, with 6,852 followers and Emir Suljagic, with 2,240.

Only two of the three members of the Bosnian state presidency have social media profiles.

The Twitter profile of Dragan Covic, the Croat...