Twitter took action on Monday by removing the verification tag, commonly known as the blue tick, from the Twitter account of Nigeria’s former Vice-President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo. According to a report by PUNCH, the special verification tag was originally intended for government officials. Interestingly, the report mentioned that Twitter did not remove the blue tick from the account of former president Major-General Muhammadu Buhari (retd).
Although, PUNCH’s correspondent said Twitter has not yet responded as to why the former vice president’s verification tag was removed, another source disclosed Twitter’s action followed a change in profile photo by the former Vice president on Monday as he ceased to be Nigeria’s vice president.
A look at Twitter’s policy for the loss of the blue checkmark, reveals that a user can lose his or her checkmark “at any time without notice” when he or she effects changes to their profile photo, display name, or username (@handle).
According to Twitter, this “will result in a temporary loss of the blue checkmark until your account is validated as continuing to meet our requirements. No further changes to your profile photo, display name, or username will be allowed during this review period.”
While Twitter has not provided an official response as to why Osinbajo’s verification tag was removed, the alteration in profile details appears to be the cause. This may also be the reason why the verification tag of Ex-President Muhammadu Buhari remained.
This is not the first time the former Vice President lost the blue checkmark besides his user name. Last month, the Micro-blogging platform initiated a tsunami of removing verification tags from accounts of top politicians, government officials, journalists, and celebrities in Nigeria.
During this time, a lot of celebrities lost their blue ticks. Celebrities such as Tony Elumelu, Peter Obi, Atiku, Tinubu, Goodluck Jonathan lost their verified blue checkmarks from their Twitter accounts.
