Reconsider Twitter Ban, NESG Urges Fed Govt

The Nigerian Economic Summit Group (NESG) has urged the Federal Government to lift its “temporary” suspension of microblogging and social networking service Twitter, in the interest of the economy.

Minister of Information Lai Mohammed announced the suspension of Twitter recently after the platform deleted a tweet by President Muhammadu Buhari it considered “abusive”.

The government said it suspended the platform because of a “litany of problems.”

But, in a statement, the NESG urged the government to reconsider this decision and rescind the suspension to foster inclusive development, global competitiveness, and much faster economic growth in Nigeria.

The suspension, NESG added, will hurt small businesses and the inflow of foreign investments.

It said: “Despite the inflow of investment into the digital economy, overall Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) inflow into Nigeria is yet to achieve its true potential.

“In the last five years, FDI inflows into Nigeria has remained around $1billion, according to data from the NBS. This amount is meagre compared with the inflows of countries such as Egypt, South Africa, and Indonesia.

“At a difficult time like this, when Nigeria must grow its economy, plug into the global digital revolution, attract patent international capital and sustained foreign currency inflow to address our foreign exchange challenges, the temporary suspension of Twitter in Nigeria sends out a wrong signal and will stand in the way of our path to rapid economic recovery.

“In addition to the negative effect of the suspension on investments, small businesses that engage in digital trade will be gravely affected, raising further concerns on unemployment, poverty, insecurity, and our economy’s attractiveness.”