Nigeria Has No Plans To Ban Facebook – Information Minister

0

The Federal Government has assured that it has no plans to ban or suspend the operations of the social media giant, Facebook, over series of inciting statements made by the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) through the platform.

This assurance was given by the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed while addressing State House Correspondents at the end of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

Mohammed had met with a team from Facebook in Abuja on Tuesday, requesting that the social media platform prevent IPOB from using its site to incite violence.

The Minister had said people had been killed because of the group’s activities.

Mohammed while responding on the possibility that the Federal Government may ban Facebook as it did to Twitter over alleged inciting, he said, “I had a very fruitful meeting with Facebook on Tuesday. At that meeting, we expressed our displeasure that Facebook was becoming a power of choice for those who stay outside Nigeria, in particular, to incite violence, killings, burning of government properties, and killing of soldiers and policemen.

“And that they should do more than what they are doing now in looking at the contents, which are unwholesome, which are being used on their platforms.

“Incidentally, the BBC did a documentary on this particular issue and found out that some of them who call themselves social media warriors in England, France, and other places, have in recent times, been using the Facebook platform to incite violence in Nigeria. And we’ve all seen the real-life impact of those warmongering, the young couple who are going to marry, soldiers who were gruesomely murdered.

“Over this weekend in Anambra state policemen were killed, military barracks were attacked. And we did warn Facebook to please do more than what they are doing now. And I must say that their response was quite encouraging. They said you’re going to do much more.”

“We don’t ban for banning sake. We ban or only suspend operations if for any reason, lives are threatened and they do not listen.”

Leave A Reply

Your email address will not be published.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.