At ICTD2013 the Exploring the Emerging Impacts of Open Data in Developing Countries (ODDC) network discussed different methods for open data research.

1. MEDIA MONITORING IN THE ODDC CASE STUDY:
Investigation of the Use of the Online National
Budget of Nigeria
BY
ODDC Research team: (University of Ilorin, Ilorin, Nigeria)
Dr. Omenogo Veronica MEJABI;
Dr. Adesina L. AZEEZ;
Mr. Adeyinka ADEDOYIN; and
Mr. Muhtahir O. OLOYEDE

2. What does this method help us
to understand?
•
•
•
In Nigeria government data, including budget data
is increasingly available online, direct from
government or through intermediaries.
It is not yet clear how aware the public are of this
budget data, or how it affects budget governance.
Media monitoring allows us to determine:
 how the public engage in the discussions of the
national budget,
 their awareness of open data,
 its potential to drive good governance, and
 the challenges to effective use of such open
budget data.

3. The Major Approach
Analysis
of content published in
Newspapers in Nigeria
Analysis
of discourse around key
search phrases on Online Social
Networking sites

4. Why Newspapers and Social Media?
Newspapers are the only traditional media that
provide access to the majority of Nigerian
citizens, particularly the middle (elite) class, without
the barrier of powering a television (poor electricity)
 Social media are the most uncensored public
domains (Emerging Public Sphere) for discussion
of governance and public issues
 Television and radio are left out because it will be
difficult to obtain past recordings of shows as it
might also be difficult to monitor live television
broadcast


5. Rationale for content analysis



This method (Content Analysis) is “a research technique for the
objective, systematic and quantitative description of the
manifest content of communication” (Berelson, 1952, p.18).
In relation to the purpose of this study, content analysis is “a
research method that uses a set of procedures to make a valid
inferences from text” (Weber, 1990, p. 9).
It is “the systematic and replicable examination of symbols of
communication, which have been assigned numeric values
according to valid measurement rules, and the analysis of
relationships involving those values using statistical
methods, in order to describe the communication, draw
inferences about its meanings, or infer from the
communication to its context, bot of production and
consumption (Riffe, Lacy and Fico, 1998, p. 20).

6. Procedures for the Newspaper Content Analysis



Selection of Newspapers - Six Nigerian national Newspapers
from over 40 national daily newspapers were purposively
selected using the criteria of circulation, readership status, and
geographical location.
Sample size and sampling technique – all newspaper
editions from December of the preceding year to May of the
following year (6 months) to cover news items on the annual
budgets of Nigeria from 2009 to 2013 (5 years) – this is the
period from formulation of the budget to presentation to the
National Assembly for debate and passing into an appropriation
bill and when it is finally presented to the public after
Presidential accent. This amounts to about 180 editions for each
newspaper per year.
Units of Analysis - all forms of news items on the annual
budget of Nigeria: News story, Columns (opinions), Editorials,
Articles/Features, News analysis, News Supplements,
Cartoons, Graphics, Interviews, Reviews

7. Variables of Concern
The analysis of the newspapers is to determine:
 Depth of the report on the annual budget
 Prominence given to the coverage or report of the annual
budget
 News items for the reports or coverage of the annual budget
 Direction (whether favourable or otherwise) of the reports on
the annual budget
 Tone (whether harsh, soft, or critical) of the reports on the
annual budget
 Major Themes or focus of the budget in the reports
 Sources
of
the
reports
(whether
government
officials, experts, civil society organisations, open data
community, etc (This will help in making inferences on the
access and use of online version of the annual budget)

8. Coding Schedule (summarized in an Excel spreadsheet):
Name
of
Analyst
:
Click the arrow, then click the entry you
want. Use Scroll if needed.
S Newspa Year
Da Month Them Pro Direc ToneQuality Assumed or Page Headlin Lead Depth in Summary
N per
Publish y
es
mine tion
of
Established Nos e
Inches of Story
O Name ed
nce
Report Sources
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
Story
Story Author
Authors Contact
Name

9. Procedures for Social Media Analysis
Process
 Conversations/debates around 2012 & 2013 annual budget
on different Nigerian online forums were searched and pulled
out for analysis with a view to establishing the level of civic
engagements that the process of the formulation as well as
the release of the budget had stimulated (2014 is now being
monitored)
 The search was carried out on the two social media platforms
- FACEBOOK and TWITTER
 Search tools - Social Mention and Google were used, with the
search phrase “Nigeria 2013 Budget” leading to links on
Facebook forums and Tweets where Nigeria 2013 budget
was mentioned. For example:
http://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?id=10000046543935
1&v=wall&story_fbid=726217430737098

10. Data Analysis




Data from the newspaper analysis are being summarized with
descriptive statistics and correlation statistics to establish
relationships among some variables of concern
From the social media, extracted content are being manually
re-categorized into categories or themes
Content from both the newspapers & social media are being
grouped into emerging categories or themes
Identification of traceable contributors to newspaper
publications and online discussions

11. Preliminary Findings – Newspaper Analysis
Proportion of Analysed Newspapers with story items
related to Nigeria's budget is 50% or less

Analysed
newspapers have
60%
average page
51%
50%
number’s of:
45%
◦

0%
This Day
The Guardian
Daily Trust
Tribune
The Punch (72)
◦
10%
Tribune (56)
◦
20%
Daily Trust (60)
◦
30%
The Guardian (72)
◦
36%
This Day (60)
◦
39%
40%
The Nation (64)
The Punch and The
Nation are still being
collated.
Total editions scanned so far:
This Day (714), The Guardian (869), Daily Trust (702), Tribune (613)
11

12. Assumed or established sources for
the news items
SOURCE
Top Government Officials
National Assembly
Others
Open Data Community
Government Spokespersons
Minister of Finance
Budget Office
Ministry of Finance Officials
Total
No. of
stories
760
224
204
165
90
49
38
36
1566
%
24.27
7.15
6.51
5.27
2.87
1.56
1.21
1.15
100.00

13. More from Newspapers – top 3 …






Relevant news items were: News stories (63%),
Features (10%), Opinions (6%), News
Commentaries (5%) …
Themes were mostly Fiscal Policies in the Budget
(28%), Capital Projects/Expenditure (21%),
Recurrent Expenditure (7%) …
Prominence given - Inside Page Minor (42%),
Inside Page Major (40%), Front Page Major (6%)
…
Direction of stories – Informing (41%), Critical
(24%), Favourable (22%)
Tone of the stories were: 45.4% Soft, 44.8%
Moderate, and 9.7% Harsh
Quality of the reports: Comprehensive (53%),
Scanty (24%), Expert analysis (23%)

14. Preliminary Findings – Social Media
Search phrase: Nigeria 2013 budget

Twitter: Criticism of sectoral
•
implement the budget
allocations in the budget
◦ Our great country spent only 3.2%
of its national budget on health at
the federal level in 2010. Of this,
83% was spent on paying salaries!
- EiE Nigeria(@EiENigeria)
◦ A country that spends 5% of its
budget on education and 30% on
security is doomed. But common
sense isn't so common.
#publicaffairs - VEEG
Communications (@VEEGGroup)
◦ Shocking: 23 per cent of National
Budget Spent on
Salaries/Allowances of 18,000 Top
Government Officials...
http://fb.me/1chL7vb8g Information Nigeria(@infonaija)
Facebook: Distrust of govt, to
Prompter – Announcement of 2013 budget
presentation by Dr Okonjo-Iweala, Minister of
Finance attracted 210 Likes
Comments:
-
Budget is well planned,it requires sincere
implementaction & God's approval. Nwabam Ugochukwu Goodluck
-
ds may be bugdet of hope,if implimented.Adeniyi Olusegun Godwin
-
Well presented.This is paper work.Nigerians
are expecting the action part of it.-Paul
Owojori Olugbenga
14

15. Challenges with the Method
Newspaper analysis:
 Absence of online archives of the newspapers dating back to
2009 – only available for The Punch
 We therefore had no alternative other than to go through the
hard copy editions of each of the newspapers one by one
 Problems with locating every edition in the sample due to
inconsistent archiving in the libraries consulted – the solution is
to visit the newspaper headquarters in the hope that they have
good archiving and retrieval systems.
Social Media analysis:
 Not all discussions/tweets are visible to the search engines
 The search phrase may not necessarily capture all related
conversations
 Are all conversations/comments to be taken seriously?

16. Conclusion

Media analysis is a good methodology
for examining discourse around a
subject of interest and therefore is
invaluable in our quest to answer the
direct
questions
on
citizen
engagement with the national budget
of Nigeria and indirectly, the related
questions on the use of open data to
drive
transparency
and
good
governance.

17. References



Berelson, B. (1952). Content Analysis in Communication.
Research. New York: Hafner.
Weber, R.P. (1990). Basic Content Analysis (2nd ed.) Newbury
Park, CA: Sage.
Riffe, Daniel, Lacy, & Fico, Fredrick, G. (1998). Analysing
Media Messages: Using Quantitative Content Analysis in
Research. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

18. THANK YOU