BREAKING: Federal Government Fumes As Twitter Deletes Buhari’s Tweet

BREAKING: Federal Government Fumes As Twitter Deletes Buhari’s Tweet—President Buhari’s Led 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 Genius Media Nigeria reports that 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.  

Recall, 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.

According to him, “Twitter may have its own rules, it’s not the universal rule. If Mr. President, anywhere in the world feels very bad and concern 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.

“Two, 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. 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.

“By whatever name, you can’t justify giving orders to kill policemen or to kill anybody you do not agree with.”