President Muhammadu Buhari has said Nigeria would lift the suspension of the ban on Twitter’s operation in Nigeria if the microblogging company agrees to meet its conditions.
The four-month-old ban was a major point of reference for the President during the nationwide broadcast to Nigerians to mark the country’s 61st Independence.
“Following the suspension of Twitter operations, Twitter Inc. reached out to the Federal Government of Nigeria to resolve the impasse. Subsequently, I constituted a Presidential Committee to engage Twitter to explore the possibility of resolving the issue,” the President said.
The Presidential Committee is said to have engaged with Twitter and addressed issues around national security cohesion; registration, physical presence, and representation; fair taxation, dispute resolution; and local content.
The President said the suspension would be lifted if all the conditions are met to allow Nigerians to continue to use the platform for business and positive engagements.
“As a country, we are committed to ensuring that digital companies use their platform to enhance the lives of our citizens, respect Nigeria’s sovereignty, cultural values and promote online safety,” he said.
Read also: Independence Day: Buhari blames rising food prices on activities of middlemen
BusinessDay checks found that Twitter service was not active on many Nigerians mobile devices.
“Just to be clear, President Buhari didn’t lift the TwtterBan. What you heard in his speech is the government’s attempt at downplaying their illegal action, laying a foundation for how to exit the hole they dug themselves into and trying to make it sound like it’s up to Twitter,” Gbenga Sesan, executive director of Paradigm Initiative, an organisation that advocates digital rights in Africa.
Sesan says the ban has done nothing to address problems used to justify the “illegal action.” Instead, the ban succeeded in only making Nigerians more aware of the many ways to circumvent the government’s orders.
The ban is a subject of joint litigation at the ECOWAS court by organisations like Paradigm Shift, Enough is Enough Nigeria (EiE), SERAP, Media Rights Agenda (MRA)
