The Nigerian government has officially given X.com a 24-ultimatum to take down a tweet that was made by Omoyele Sowore, a controversial politician and activist, criticising President Bola Tinubu for declaring in Brazil that corruption in Nigeria has stopped under his rule.
Sowore’s tweet in question, reads: “This criminal @officialABAT actually went to Brazil to state that there is NO MORE corruption under his regime in Nigeria. What audacity to lie shamelessly!”
In a letter to the chairman and CEO of X.com in Bastrop Country, Texas, USA, the federal government said that Sowore’s tweet was a deliberate attempt to discredit and disparage Tinubu while also promoting an ideology that could cause serious harm, incite violence, cybercrime, and hate speech.
A 24-hour ultimatum was issued by the Director General of the Department of State Service (DSS) in the letter, demanding that the offending tweet be removed. The letter also claimed that the tweet could put national security at risk, cause tension, and degrade Nigeria’s standing in the international community.
According to DSS’s letter, Sowore’s tweet renders both the perpetrator and the outlet responsible for the violation criminally liable.
“The author and purveyor of the inflammatory online Publication against Mr. President is very much aware that the publication is also prohibited by Section 2 of the Terrorism Prevention and Prohibition Act, 2022 and other relevant Laws of Nigeria.
“It is not in doubt that the words employed by Mr. Omoyele Sowore is misleading information, online harassment and abuse willful intention of furthering and ideology, capable of serious harm, hate speech, cause disunity, discredit the President of Nigeria in the comity of Nations to damage the image of Nigeria and cause threat to National Security of the Country,” it said.
The DSS demanded that the X.com corporation must as a matter of it’s own policy, pull down the tweet and it’s attendant re-tweet.
“This demand is on unequivocal with it’s attendant consequences. Should you fail. neglect and refuse to comply with the command in this notice, the Federal Government of Nigeria will be compelled to take far-reaching sweeping and the across the board measures through our organisation, whose mandate cover such Criminal Act.
“In the light of the above. having been make official to you, 24 hours is sufficient enough to take necessary action”, the letter said.
Meanwhile, Human rights activist and presidential candidate of the African Action Congress in the 2023 elections, Omoyele Sowore, has vowed not to delete a tweet critical of President Bola Tinubu, despite a reported request from the Department of State Services to X, demanding its removal.
In a Sunday morning post on his X account, Sowore said that the social media site had been in touch with him over the DSS request.
His insistence on keeping the tweet live could lead to a resurgence of public discussion about government surveillance, free speech, and the boundaries of dissent in Nigerian democracy.
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