Presidency: Twitter Suspended For Promoting IPOB Activities

By Ayodele Oni

Facing an, almost, worldwide attacks and condemnation for banning the use of Twitter in Nigeria, the Presidency has distanced the downing of President Muhammadu Buhari’s Post by Twitter to its roundly condemned action. It said it had given Twitter a long rope.

Nigeria had banned Twitter after it took down Buhari’s Post, which the company saw as a hate speech, which boarders  on a plan to perpetrate genocide.

But the FG, in the evening of Saturday, June 5, 2021, declared that removing Buhari’s Post, condemnable as it was had nothing as such to do with it, but has everything to do with Twitter’s seeming support for the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra, IPOB.

The FG  maintained that the international network, Twitter, might have misconstrued President Mohamadu Buhari statement, which led to the suspension on its account.

SSA Media to the President, Garba Shehu, insisted that the Federal Government’s action to suspend Twitter, was not just because of President Buhari’s removal from the global network.

Shehu said in a statement that: “The temporary suspension of Twitter is not just a response to the removal of the President’s post.

“There has been a litany of problems with the social media platform in Nigeria, where misinformation and fake news spread through it have had real world violent consequences. All the while, the company has escaped accountability.

“Nevertheless, the removal of President Buhari’s tweet was disappointing. The censoring seemed based on a misunderstanding of the challenges Nigeria faces today.

“The President in his address at the United Nations General Assembly, UNGA in 2019 said “the world was shocked and startled by the massacre in New Zealand by a lone gunman taking the lives of 50 worshippers.”

“This and similar crimes which have been fueled by social media networks risk seeping into the fabric of an emerging digital culture.

“Major Tech companies must be alive to their responsibilities. They cannot be allowed to continue to facilitate the spread of religious, racist, xenophobic and false messages capable of inciting whole communities against each other, leading to loss of many lives. This could tear some countries apart.

“President Buhari has, therefore, been warning against social media’s disruptive and divisive influences and the Government’s  action is not a knee-jerk reaction to Twitter’s preposterous deletion of his tweet which should have been read in full.

“The tweet was not a threat, but a statement of fact.

“A terrorist organisation (IPOB) poses a significant threat to the safety and security of Nigerian citizens.

“When the President said that they will be treated “in a language they understand,” he merely reiterated that their force shall be met with force.

“It is a basic principle of security services response world over.

“This is not promotion of hate, but a pledge to uphold citizens’ right to freedom from harm. The Government cannot be expected to capitulate to terrorists.

“IPOB is proscribed under Nigerian law. Its members murder innocent Nigerians.

“They kill policemen and set government property on fire. Now, they have amassed a substantial stockpile of weapons and bombs across the country.

“Twitter does not seem to appreciate the national trauma of our country’s civil war. This government shall not allow a recurrence of that tragedy.”

Earlier the Minister for Information, Lai Mohammed had wondered why Twitter condone the posts by IPOB Leader, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, saying that Twitter action was suspicious.

However, the Federal Government has come under condemnation for the ban on Twitter from Nigerians, and the International Community.