What Internet Search And Facebook Data Tells Us About Malta’s Election Campaign – Part 1
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has piqued the interest of the Maltese electorate far more than the ongoing election, according to Google search data.
Two weeks into a Maltese election campaign, one would have expected local politics to be the primary topic of conversation at social gatherings across the country, but things haven’t really panned out that way.
Ever since the world woke up to a full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, the war has captivated audiences across the globe and has stolen the spotlight from an election, which, truth be told, was already destined to be less interesting.
There appears to be general consensus that the only matter really up for discussion is the size of the Labour Party’s victory, likely leading large segments of the electorate to switch off from the election.
According to Google Trends – a Google tool that maps search traffic to find changes in interest about a particular subject over time – searches for both Labour and PN are running at some 30% lower during the first two weeks of this campaign than they did during the same period in 2017.
Searches for Russia and Ukraine, on the other hand, are through the roof and have dwarfed those for local political parties since the start of the war.
In fact, at their peak, the number of searches for the two countries was ten times higher than the number of searches for Labour, PN, and their respective leaders combined
Putin and Zelenskyy more interesting than Robert and Bernard
The war has made Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy an overnight celebrity with the world captivated by the story of the man who went from comedian to war-time president over the span of a few years.
Zelenskyy has garnered a considerable following online after reports emerged about his decision to remain in Ukraine and fight with his countrymen.
This was also the case in Malta with data showing that interest in Zelenskyy was at its highest on 27th February, three days after the start of the invasion. At their peak, searches for Zelenskyy were roughly double those for Abela but, somewhat surprisingly, a third lower than those for Bernard Grech.
If one were to include searches for the words “Ukraine president” however it exceeds that for both Bernard and Robert.
Searches for all three are outnumbered by those for Russia’s trigger-happy president Vladimir Putin.
Surge in interest in foreign news
Malta’s interest in the war is also evidenced by data on searches for major international news organisations, which increased dramatically after the invasion.
The first day of the invasion also saw searches for BBC News, Sky News, CNN and Euronews almost surpass those for all local media houses combined.
Searches for Russia Today – Russia’s state-controlled and funded international TV network – also increased following in the invasion, however the increase was substantially smaller than that for mainstream media outlets.
The controversial media company has since been banned in the EU for its spreading of false information.
Interest can also be negative
It is worth noting that while search data can be a valuable tool for identifying spikes in interest about a particular subject, it offers little insight into whether that increased interest is positive or negative.
For example, there was a spike in searches for Bernard Grech on 27th February, incidentally the same day searches for Zelenskyy reached their maximum. On that day, Grech urged the government to take a more proactive stance against Russia, and it is conceivable that the increase in interest is related to the fact that Grech was speaking out about a subject that the country was interested in.
It was, however, also the day Labour Party media published footage of Bernard Grech which it said showed the PN leader wanted to “demolish the Labour Party headquarters”, meaning it is just as likely that the increased traffic was a result of the manner in which the Labour Party reported Grech’s cheeky comment and therefore largely negative.
Stay tuned for part 2 of this article, which will look at the social media battle between Grech and Abela.
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