Ecuador

“Hello everyone, I’m in a meeting more boring than dancing with the mother-in-law, later I’ll write, I love you all very much, especially the poisoned ones!”, Correa tweeted using a disparaging term to refer to his political opposition. Rafael Correa’s Twitter style is contentious to say the least, taking on the media critical of his leadership style: “Did you read the editorial in the Washington Post? poor gringos, they don’t understand anything that happens in our America. Best”, he tweeted after the Post had criticized him for his lawsuit against the Ecuadoran paper El Universo. Correa uses Twitter to counter “a certain corrupt press”. “The fight against the corrupt press is a continental and even global struggle” he tweeted in reply to a follower. Rafael Correa is one of the most conversational world leaders with 71% of his tweets being @replies to his followers with a note to his ministers to “tend to” their requests. Rafael Correa only follows two other Twitter users, namely Christina Kirchner, President of Argentina, and Hugo Chavez, President of Venezuela. His most re-tweeted tweet is a shout out for EMELEC, the country’s most popular football club.

The tweets of the official Twitter account of the Ecuadorian presidency are more restrained and formal. The administration is prolific, sending on average over 16 tweets a day. The administration broadcasts President Correa’s daily activites often re-tweeting or mentioning the President’s personal account @MashiRafael. The Presidency uses hash tags extensively with 1 or more hasthags per tweet, a third of them being #correa (1270). The administration’s most re-tweeted tweet is the announcement of a meeting between “Mujica (Uruguay), Rousseff (Brazil), Correa (Ecuador), Morales (Bolivia) and Piñeira (Chile), about the crisis in Paraguay” on 21 June 2012.