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Sometimes back in 2018 there were rumors from some certain quarters of the Nation of the Nigerian Government acquiring a technology that has the capacity of shutting down the internet due to the some government information leaking on the social media. Read More.
Although we might dismiss the news as irrelevant or false because of the credibility of the group involved but we can’t dismiss the issues of journalists who have been detained indefinitely by the Government because they had access to some information or because they criticize the government in the dailies. read more
There is also the issue of Freedom on the net bill also know as Digital Rights and Freedom Bill that has been forwarded to the President after passing second reading since 2016 but yet to be attended to. Read More.
This bill if signed would have made a lot of significant impact against the daily harassment by the police who are also monitoring all activities both on Facebook and Twitter. Read More.
Since last year till now, there has been increase in the arrest of activists who have raised awareness about the ills of the government with evidences. Some notables ones includes Deji Adeyanju, Jones Abiri etc. Read more.
Current Nigerian Government has shown overtime to have a complete disregard for rule of law or what is popularly known as Due Process. So many incidents since they were sworn in on May 2016 till date, one of the notable ones is Elzaky who has been in detention since 2016 even though there is a court order for bail yet the Government has decided not to honor it. Read More. Also there is Samuel Ogundipe a nigerian blogger, who has been arrested by the government since 2016, and yet to be released. Read more.
Election year is here, and so has there been great increase in harassment and intimidation by the government. Last week alone we saw a complete disregard of the constitution by the Buhari led government with the illegal suspension of the Chief Justice of the Nation who is in charge of swearing in the election tribunal because he didn’t accept some names on the list sent to him. They raised a faux allegation against him, sent him to a court and suspended without following the written steps in the constitution.
This alone has raised a lot of storms in the Judiciary Arm of the Government with a strike action against the government probably starting tomorrow Monday 27, 2019. Read More.
With the above events, there have been speculations on social media especially on twitter that the next thing to get shut down is the social media/internet and though we might say it is impossible but with the recent actions of the government, there is nothing impossible again.
While we hope it is just some speculations alone, we must therefore make sure we do all in our power to say no by raising our voice daily against the government without fear.
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Have a great week ahead.