Nigeria’s government is suspending Twitter operations in the country “indefinitely”, the country’s information minister has said.
Lai Mohammed said the ban was due to “the persistent use of the platform for activities… capable of undermining Nigeria’s corporate existence”.
The Federal Government has suspended, indefinitely, the operations of the microblogging and social networking service, Twitter, in Nigeria.
— Fed Min of Info & Nat’l Orien (@FMINONigeria) June 4, 2021
It comes just days after a tweet by President Muhammadu Buhari was removed for breaching the site’s rules.
No reference was made to the social media giant’s decision.
The site – which was still available to users in Nigeria following Friday’s announcement – removed a tweet sent by the president on 1 June.
It referred to the 1967-70 Nigerian Civil War and to treating “those misbehaving today” in “the language they will understand”.
The Minister said the Federal Government has also directed the
National Broadcasting l Commission (NBC) to immediately commence the process of licensing all OTT and social media operations in Nigeria.— Fed Min of Info & Nat’l Orien (@FMINONigeria) June 4, 2021
A Twitter spokesperson said the post “was in violation of the Twitter Rules. The account owner will be required to delete the violative Tweet and spend 12 hours with their account in read-only mode”. The statement gave no further details.