The Nigerian government has suspended indefinitely, the operations of globally renowned social networking service, Twitter in the country.
Lai Mohammed, Nigeria’s Information minister, said the decision was taken because of the persistent use of the platform for activities capable of undermining Nigeria’s corporate existence.
Twitter on Wednesday deleted a tweet by Nigerian president Muhammadu Buhari in which he vowed to forcefully subdue separatist group the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) whom he accused of waging a campaign of attacks against government security forces as well as public infrastructure.
The tweet referred to the 1967-70 Nigerian Civil War and to treating “those misbehaving today” in “the language they will understand”.
The tweet read thus:
“Many of those misbehaving today are too young to be aware of the destruction and loss of lives that occurred during the Nigerian Civil War. Those of us in the fields for 30 months, who went through the war, will treat them in the language they understand.”
Muhammadu Buhari, President of Nigeria
A Twitter spokesperson said the post was in violation of its rules.
The spokesperson also noted that the account owner would be required to delete the violative Tweet and spend 12 hours with their account in read-only mode”.
Consequently, the government made its move on Friday to express its disapproval of twitter’s decision.
It also directed the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) to immediately commence the process of licensing all OTT and social media operations in the country.
The Federal Government has suspended, indefinitely, the operations of the microblogging and social networking service, Twitter, in Nigeria.The Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, announced the suspension in a statement issued in Abuja on Friday, citing the persistent use of the platform for activities that are capable of undermining Nigeria’s corporate existence.The Minister said the Federal Government has also directed the National Broadcasting l Commission (NBC) to immediately commence the process of licensing all OTT and social media operations in Nigeria.
Nigerians have expressed worry that this announcement would ‘lock them out’ from twitter.
However, as events unfold, Technopreneur will keep you updated.