President John Dramani Mahama dominated Ghana’s online political conversation in September 2026, drawing 2,745 of the 4,838 figure tagged sentiment readings recorded by IMANI PULSE. His mean sentiment score still settled at negative 0.01, a near-perfect balance between praise and criticism across X, Facebook and TikTok.
The September edition of IMANI PULSE reached that finding by tracking 17,806 public posts on the three platforms during the month. The analysis sought to establish what drives sentiment in Ghana’s digital political space, at a time when galamsey, narcotics controversies and economic pain competed for public attention.
“The central challenge, therefore, is not simply to ask whether Ghana’s online political conversation is positive or negative.
“It is to ask what is driving the sentiment, whether citizens are debating policies or personalities, and whether moments of intense political attention are translating into meaningful conversations about governance and public outcomes.”
IMANI PULSE, September 2026
Mahama’s Dominance of Ghana’s Online Political Conversation
President Mahama’s 2,745 mentions amounted to 57 percent of every figure-tagged mention in the dataset. The report notes that his share was “more than the next five figures combined.”
That visibility arrived in a crowded month. Galamsey emerged as the loudest and most negative issue, generating 2,647 mentions at a mean sentiment of negative 0.72. Parliament added its own heat through a clash over a narcotics probe.
Against that backdrop, President Mahama’s tone held remarkably level. IMANI describes it as “almost exactly balanced,” with 1,360 positive readings set against 1,125 negative ones.
Those figures produced a mean of negative 0.01. A score that close to zero points to a contested conversation in which supporters and critics spoke in similar volume.
How Mahama’s Sentiment Compares With Other Political Figures
Other figures fared differently. Hon Afenyo-Markin recorded the most negative profile of the month, with 66 percent of his 454 mentions turning negative and a mean of negative 0.27. The Minority Leader’s “24-hour cocaine economy” attack and its walk-back ran alongside the narcotics probe clash in Parliament.
Dr Bawumia and Ato Forson finished slightly positive at +0.07 and +0.04, the only two figures above zero for the month. Mahama sat just below that line, ahead of every figure with a deeper negative reading.
The report also measured whether citizens discussed policy or personality, and President Mahama led that measure by a wide margin. “73% of his classified mentions were about policy, against 46% for Bawumia and 7% for Kennedy Agyapong, whose coverage was almost entirely about personality.”
The Big Push infrastructure programme ran net positive at +0.28. Opinion on the cedi split more evenly, with 454 positive mentions against 610 negative ones.
Economic Pressures Behind the Wider Mood
Economic concerns stayed prominent across the month. Currency drew 1,361 mentions, while fuel and energy followed with 1,135, the highest volumes among economic topics.
Tone told a harsher story. Cost of living recorded negative 0.25, debt and the IMF negative 0.24, and fuel negative 0.23, the most negative economic readings in the report. Narcotics also reshaped the late September debate, with cocaine drawing 1,344 mentions, 89 percent of them negative, while EOCO attracted 1,939 and narcotics 393.
The data show that visibility and sentiment do not always move together. President Mahama commanded most of the attention yet avoided the sharp negative skew that marked Hon. Afenyo-Markin’s coverage, and his policy-heavy share of discussion stood out among the figures the report examined.
The same data show where pressure sits. Galamsey, cost of living and debt carried the heaviest negative tone, and they remain issues tied to governance outcomes.
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