Perhaps one of the problems with Canadian politics is that campaigning in Canada has no creative flare. In our fast-pace media driven society we want to be entertained and nothing says entertainment like great political slogans!
In my first blog post I started to explain why I decided to name this blog 213 – Da My Area. To recap the 213 is the country code for Liberia and Da My Area is a brilliant political slogan adopted by the Unity Parties' P.R team for this election.
When I arrived in Monrovia one of the first things I noticed was the political signage all over the city. The Unity Party posters are particularly noticeable (not only because they have the largest budget for marketing) because they have strategically placed their posters on major state buildings all over the city, for example on the football stadium the poster reads;
Sports and Recreation
Da Their Area
On the court house;
Law and Order
Da Their Area
On the Ministry of Gender;
Women’s Rights
Da Their Area
As a newbie here I didn’t fully grasp the brilliance of this campaign slogan, naive I assumed that using Liberian English was Mamma Ellen’s PR teams way of showing her solidarity with the people. It wasn’t until one of my roommates kindly explained to me that Da My Area was recently a number one hit song in Liberia. Most of the songs that become top 40 here in Liberia are Nigerian artists but this song is pure Liberian. At just over 7 minutes long it is the perfect campaigning beat to be blasted in the back of pickup trucks driving through the city with your political supporters decked out in your specially made campaign lapa (more on local dress later).
At 72 years of age you have to give Ma Ellen some serious street cred, catchy and creative political marketing…Da her area!
