Nigeria suspends Twitter indefinitely

The Nigerian government has announced the suspension of Twitter operations in the country.

The Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, announced the suspension in a statement issued in Abuja on Friday, citing the persistent use of the platform for activities that are capable of undermining Nigeria’s corporate existence. The Minister said the Federal Government has also directed the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) to immediately commence the process of licensing all OTT and social media operations in Nigeria.

The suspension was also made ironically via the official Twitter account of The Federal Ministry of Information and Culture, Nigeria by Segun Adeyemi, Special Assistant To The President (Media) Office of the Minister of Information and Culture Abuja

Of course, this suspension is as a result of the social media’s deletion of a post by Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari invoking the country’s civil war. The social media firm said Buhari’s tweet violated its “abusive behaviour” policy, leading to a 12-hour suspension of his account.

Implications of the suspension

This means that Twitter users in Nigeria will not be able to use the platform during the suspension. This suspension might be enforced by the Nigerian Broadcasting Commission directing the Telecom companies and ISPs operating in Nigeria to block twitter’s IP addresses

This will force users in Nigeria to bypass this suspension by using VPNs.