Guild Of Editors kick against FG’s proposed social media regulation
The Nigerian Guild Of Editors (NGE) has kicked against the proposed social media regulation as the Guild warned that the plan would further worsen the country’s rating in poor record of Press Freedom and freedom of speech, which stands 120 out of 180 nations survey.
“Such synergy and partnership in an information Age, is the best way to make the most of the advantage of social media which far outweigh any perceived disadvantage,” said the group.
In a communique issued by the standing committee of the Guild following a meeting held in Lagos recently, it argued that the proposed legislation violate section 39 of the 1999 constitution which guarantees “freedom of expression”, including the right to hold opinion and to receive and impact ideas and information without interference.
Invoking Article 13(4) of the Nigerian Guild of Editors Constitution, the Standing Committee constituted itself into an Electoral College and elected Mustapha Isah as Acting President of the Guild, to fill the vacant position of Funke Egbemode as President, upon her appointment and acceptance of offer as Commissioner for Information and Civic Orientation in Osun State.
The Standing Committee discussed the state of the nation and the media and took particular note of the ongoing plans by the Federal Government of Nigeria to ‘sanitise’ the Social Media space and thereby resolved as follows:
That the Federal Government should rescind the decision to regulate the Social Media, as such measure is in clear contravention of Section 39 of the 1999 Constitution (As amended), which guarantees every Nigerian citizen the right to “freedom of expression, including the right to hold opinions and to receive and impart ideas and information without interference.”
The Guild reminded the Federal Government of the dire consequences of similar attempts in the past to gag freedom of speech, as such initiatives were usually misconstrued by security agents and some public officials to harass, arrest and in most cases, illegally detain journalists and other Nigerians for holding their opinions.
Advising the Federal Government to seek ways to maximise social media to disseminate information on the activities and policies of government, rather than its current attempt to stifle it, the Guild urged the government to engage the founders and promoters of social media, namely: Facebook, Instagram and Twitter among others – to creatively find ways of sieving information disseminated through their respective channels, to curtail extremisms of violence and hate speech.
Recognising that Nigeria is already in the red zone of nations with very poor record of Press Freedom and Freedom of Speech, the Guild notes, for instance, that the 2019 World Press Freedom Index published by Reporters Without Borders places Nigeria in a distant 120th position among 180 nations under review. Also, in the 2019 Global Impunity Index published by the Committee for the Protection of Journalists (CPJ), which chronicles countries where criminal groups, politicians, government officials, and other powerful actors resort to violence to silence critical views, dissent and particularly the media, Nigeria ranks as high as the 12th position, sharing the top bracket with impunity-prone and conflict-riddled nations like Syria, Afghanistan, Somalia, Mexico, Pakistan etcetera.
Sadly, this is not a good profile and the Federal Government of Nigeria should not take further actions that would add to this unpleasant tar on the nation by seeking to ‘sanitise’ Social Media but, should rather build bridges and collaborations with the Nigerian media and promoters of social media. Such synergy and partnership in an Information Age, is the best way to make the most of the advantages of social media which far outweigh any perceived disadvantages.
The Guild noted that Nigeria had enough extant laws, including the Cyber Crime Act 2015, to deal with issues of ‘hate speech’ and ‘Fake News’. It urged the government to test such laws in the courts of competent jurisdictions in accordance with due process of the law rather than create another legal instrument and atmosphere that would give agents of state the latitude to harass and criminalise citizens, especially journalists.
The Guild observed that in most cases, it was the officials of governments at all levels that pushed out Fake News and hate speech by their words and actions; stressing that it behooved government actors to check their actions and utterances.
The Guild therefore called on government and security agencies to release forthwith all journalists being detained nationwide, as their continued detention ran contrary to the grains of the Constitution.
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