The Federal Government has kicked against Twitter that on Wednesday deleted President Muhammadu Buhari’s tweet that spoke of treating people in the “language they understand.”
The Presidency questioned the role of Twitter in the secessionist agitation in the South-East following the social media’s deletion of a tweet by President Muhammadu Buhari evoking the memories of the civil war to threaten “those misbehaving” in the region.
The president had said in his series of tweets on his handle @mbuhari on Tuesday: “Many of those misbehaving today are too young to be aware of the destruction and loss of lives that occurred during the Nigerian Civil War. Those of us in the fields for 30 months, who went through the war, will treat them in the language they understand.”
Twitter has now deleted the posts citing violation of its rules.
The Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, who reacted to the tweet deletion at the end of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting at the presidential villa, Abuja, wondered why Twitter would delete President Buhari’s post without doing same to the inciting ones that had been posted by Nnamdi Kanu, the leader of the proscribed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOP).
He alleged that the role of Twitter in Nigeria is suspect, noting that the social media platform also backed opponents of government during the #EndSARS protests.
Mohammed said, “I don’t see anywhere in the world where an organisation, a person will stay somewhere outside Nigeria, and will direct his members to attack the symbols of authority, the police, the military, especially when that organisation has been proscribed.
“Any organisation that gives directives to its members, to attack police stations, to kill policemen, to attack correctional centres, to kill warders, and you are now saying that Mr President does not have the right to express his dismay and anger about that? We are the ones guilty of double standards.
“Twitter may have its own rules; it’s not the universal rule. If Mr President feels very bad and concerned about a situation, he is free to express such views. Now, we should stop comparing apples with oranges. If an organisation is proscribed, it is different from any other which is not proscribed.”