Nigeria’s government stands ready to meet with Twitter officials to discuss the suspension of intelligence services in the West African country.
Nigeria’s government stands ready to meet with Twitter officials to discuss the suspension of short messaging in the West African country. The Ministry of Information and Culture announced on Tuesday. Twitter asked for the meeting “to find a way forward,” said the ministry’s spokesman, Segun Adeyemi. The state with more than 200 million inhabitants will send a delegation of six ministers, it said. When and where the meeting would take place was initially unclear.
A few hours earlier, the court of the West African economic community Ecowas ruled on Tuesday that Nigeria should not “intimidate, sanction, arrest or prosecute” people who use Twitter in Africa’s largest democracy.
Nigeria’s government suspended Twitter indefinitely on June 4 after the platform deleted a controversial tweet by President Muhammadu Buhari about the Nigerian civil war and suspended the head of state’s account for twelve hours.
The ministry did not give a specific reason for the suspension, but pointed out that the platform was repeatedly used for activities that could undermine Nigeria’s existence. The National Broadcasting Commission then declared the use of Twitter for information purposes as “unpatriotic”. Citizens who bypass the government’s Twitter bans have been threatened with prosecution. The government opened an account with Indian Twitter competitor Koo in June.
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