Nigeria will treat social media platforms like Twitter – Presidency

The Federal Government has revealed that any law governing the operations of Twitter in Nigeria will apply to other social media networks.

This was disclosed on Wednesday by the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed in Cairo at a meeting with his counterpart, Egypt Minister of Communication and Information Technology, Dr Amir Talaat.

The meeting was a bilateral discussion with Africa Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) on how Nigeria can access funding to support its growing creative industry.

During his engagement with the Egyptian Minister, Lai Mohammed disclosed that the requisite laws within the National Broadcasting Corporation Act and Code will be amended to ensure compliance by all social networks operating within the country.

“The beauty of the engagement with Twitter is immense. Whatever applies to Twitter will apply to all other social media platforms, be it WhatsApp, Facebook, or any other.

“That is why we will be having a retreat to amend the NBC Act and the NBC Code to incorporate these new gains we made with the engagement with Twitter,’’ he said.

The Minister also stated that Twitter had agreed to operate under the auspices of Nigerian law by payment of taxes and collaboration with agencies to ensure accountability.

“Twitter has agreed to comply to all payable taxes as they are operating under the Nigerian laws and this they agreed to do within one week of restoring their operations.

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“Twitter agreed to immediately work with the Federal Government in the area of code of conduct which is in line with global best practices

“Twitter agreed to immediately enroll Nigerians in its Law Enforcement portals and Partners Support Portal.

“The law enforcement portal will provide dedicated channels for the Nigerian laws enforcement agencies to escalate reports on contents that violate the code of conduct or the national laws.

“Similarly, the partner support portal provides a direct channel for government to engage twitter staff to manage prohibited contents,’’ Lai said.