By Lateef Adegbite
When Pastor Enoch Adejare Adeboye, the General Overseer of the Redeem Christian Church of God, RCCG, advised President Muhammadu Buhari, a retired Army General,’’ to restructure Nigeria’’, October, last year’’ to forestall possible break up’’ and the Presidency response that’’ it cannot succumb to threat over restructuring’’, the Clergyma had n withdrawn to his shells util the government recent problem with Twitter, a North American Country of the United States, US , Multinational internet Company.
At the instance of the The Katsina state born Nigerian President, who had problem with the Company for daring to remove his Tweet which had made reference to the Nigeria Civil war and a threat to deal with the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPB, and other Criminal elements plotting to destroy the country in the Language they will understand and the Nigerian Communication Commission, NCC, including the Nigeria Broadcasting Corporation, NBC, to move into action to implement the government policy of the ban on Twitter microblogging of its site in Nigeria.
Isa Patami, the minister of Communications and Digital Economy and his Counterpart in the ministry of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, had expected Corporate Organisations, Churches and idividuals, to support the Nigerian government action by deactivating Twitter from their mobile phones.
Abubakar Malami, a senior Advocate of Nigeria, SAN, and Attorney General of the Federation and minister of Justice, may have made matters by directing the ministry’s Public prosecutor to be ready to prosecute those who may want to refuse to follow the government directive to deactivate Twitter from their phone, an indirect way of telling the Comptroller General of the Nigerian Correctional Services, to throw the door of the prisons open to receive the Twitter offenders who may be Convicted in Court. Aisha Buhari, the Nigerian First Lady may have shown a good example by deactivating her Twitter to show solidarity with the Nigerian government.
But Adeboye, and other big time-time men of Good, including the business moguls and the Multinational Companies , would not take it. Take for instance, Adeboye, the RCCG, General overseer, who was said to have Teeted , recently. He may have sent a message to the Nigerian President and the Law Enforcement agencies Authorities, including Malami, Nigeria’s Attorney General that the order is not for RCCG, which ‘’is domiciled in more than 170 nations, across the world. He had justified his Tweet to the fact that ‘’it is in line with Article 19 of the United Nations, UN, Universal Human Rights declarations.
Many believe that the RCCG , General overseer, may have Tweeted to test the might of the Nigerian President to dare to arrest him because of its backlash effect. The government may have ignored him as it was said to have opened channels of discussions with Jack Dorsey led Twitter to resolve the areas of Conflict.
The government may have resorted to dialogue with Twitter because it had failed’’ to win the support of the Diplomats from the US, United Kingdom, UK, European Union, EU, and Canada among other countries, to the ban on the Twitter activities in Nigeria. The government was initially optimistic that the Dipolmatic Missions will support the Twitter ban the same way they have thrown their weight o in the war against the insecurity situation in the country but was disappointed.
Perhaps, to draw the mind of the aggrieved Diplomats back to the country, Geofrey Onyeama, the minister of Foreign Affairs, at a meeting with them, on Monday , June 7, 2021, which had the backing the retired Army General, had reconfirmed that the government is already into discussions with Twitter. He was id to have failed ‘’ to disclose the duration’’ of the suspension slammed on the US, Multinational internet Company.
The Diplomats may have told the Onyeama, the Nigerian Foreign Affairs minister, who has the ear of Buhari, at the meeting, that they cannot do without Tweeting. ‘’Twitter is a very important Platform for us, and it brings a lot of viewers globally ‘’, they had said.
Mary Beth Leonard, the US, Ambassador ,to Nigeria, may have dampened the hope of the Nigerian Foreign Affairs minister winning their support to back the government when she bluntly told him that the’’ diplomatic Community stood by its position that free access to the ability oneself is actually very important’’.
The government may have known that it is in a win situation that it appears to have soft pedal by giving the condition that need to be fulfilled by the US internet Company to restore its normal Operations in Nigeria. The condition was that’’ the Platform would be used responsibly by Nigerians, particular, IPOB members, which many believe would be very difficult to fulfill as Twitter Operations are not only based in Nigeria.
Recall the Enugu state born Foreign Affairs minister had told the Diplomats at the Monday meeting that the Nigerian government took the decision to ban Twitter activities in the country ‘’to stop them from further being used as Platforms for destabilization and facilitation of criminality or encouragement of criminalities’’.
Giving the direction of the discussions, the minister who had emerged from the meeting may have gladdened the heart of Nigerians when he said that the government delegation had a fruitful discussion with the Diplomats as they were able to review the situation that had necessitated the Twitter ban in Nigeria, with hope of restroring their services back.
Informed sources told The Value News that the outcome of the discussion at the meeting between the officials of the ministry of the Foreign Affairs and the Diplomats, had been communicated to Buhari, who is expected to take a second look on the government action and make a pronouncement on the Twitter case soon.
Notwithstanding the government slow speed in restoring Twitter services in Nigeria, the Company Technical personnel were said to have gone back to the drawing board to take another look at its operations world wide to avoid a situation where countries could easily tamper with its operations whenever, there is a problem.
This is evident with what have happened in the West African country of Nigeria which had put over 4omillion Nigerians which have Twitter account in the dark over the last one week.
The Company may have learnt its lesson from Nigeria as the Technical men are said to be working round the round the clock to restore the Nigerian Operations without further delay to retain its millions loyal Twitter account users .
