The leaders of the country’s two main opposition parties, who have used the app more actively than the ruling Liberals to win over supporters, stand to suffer from Canada’s ban on Chinese-owned TikTok on smartphones provided by the government.
Among the politicians who actively used TikTok to reach out to people were the leaders of the two largest opposition parties: Pierre Poilievre of the Conservative Party and Jagmeet Singh of the New Democratic Party. But, that plan might be in trouble after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s administration declared a ban on TikTok on government-issued smartphones owing to security threats, amid concerns that user information might be obtained by the Chinese government.
Legislators from the opposing Conservatives and the ruling Liberals responded by suspending their TikTok accounts, which was a step further. Additionally, the party said that liberal Legislators received instructions to delete the application from their personal devices and suspend any associated accounts. The minority government of Justin Trudeau, led by Singh of the NDP, similarly deleted his account. Singh’s party and the NDP have an arrangement that is anticipated to keep the NDP in office till 2025. With the help of his dance moves in his trademark neon turbans in TikTok videos for the 2021 election, Singh amassed more than 800,000 followers. Singh has since used TikTok to share clips of his family and political goals.
Trudeau, for instance, didn’t have a public account on the app, in contrast to the ruling Liberal Party’s more understated presence. According to Nik Nanos of Nanos Research, who was speaking to Reuters, “Any constraint on social media is a disadvantage for any opposition leader,” as they lack the established benefit of frequently appearing in more traditional media. Singh’s office stated that it “takes all security issues seriously” and that it “would comply with any directions given regarding the prohibition of TikTok from government devices to ensure that information is secured.”
As for pausing to consider how to utilize social media platforms responsibly, Singh told reporters that it is “something that I feel very comfortable doing and I have no fear to do.”
Last week, the European Parliament became the latest EU institution to prohibit the app from being used on employee phones, and on Wednesday, a U.S. House committee backed a bill giving President Biden the authority to outright prohibit the app. About the Canadian ban, TikTok has also expressed its concern, claiming that it was implemented “without stating any specific security concern or contacting us.”
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According to analysts like Nanos, anything that restricts or reduces social media’s function as a platform might be problematic for politicians like the Conservatives’ Poilievre, who avoids the mainstream media in Ottawa.
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