Twitter blocked, journalism threatened in Nigeria

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) is alarmed by the Nigeria government’s decision to suspend Twitter throughout the country after the social media platform deleted one of the president’s tweets, and by the attacks and threats it poses to the media according to journalists interviewed by RSF. Nigerian media outlets are shocked by Twitter’s suspension for an indefinite period that the government announced on 4 June. “It’s a big blow,” said Jide Oyekunle, a reporter for the Daily Independent newspaper. With 40 million Nigerian users (five times as many as in France), “Twitter is an excellent source of trending topics to not go dry as a journalist,” Oyekunle added.  “We don’t know what is happening, what is being said on issues,” said Lizzy Chikpi, a reporter for Order Paper, a news site that specialises in covering legislative matters.  Ironically, it was on Twitter that the information ministry announced the ban. On 7 June, the National Broadcasting Commission, the broadcast media regulator, went further and ordered radio and TV stations to delete their Twitter accounts, warning them that continuing to use Twitter would be regarded as “unpatriotic.” Neither the ministry nor the regulator had deleted their own accounts at the time of writing. …
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