Social Media Regulation In Nigeria; The Necessity, Cost And Best Alternatives By Mujib Dada-Qadri (Caballo).

“If it bleeds, it leads”. Sensationalism and emotionsalism have always been part of the marketing custom of the media and the social media is the newest “ally”. In fact, the traditional media couldn’t resist the “intimidating attraction and competition” of social media. But the fundamental question is whether the citizens are not also pawns in the machinations of the media like they are in the games of politicians. The reader may likely want to share the sentiments that the press/media have always been on the side of the oppressed and serve as the only guardian of the social conscience. This article will unravel the complexities, controversies and modern challenges of modern media and the dilemma of the state.

Interestingly, with the sudden rise of internet and accompanying growth of social media in Africa, we have surely witnessed rise in political consciousness. The Arab spring is a memorable one and remains one of the most disruptive. But the Nigerian reality is more “dribbling” as the social media has given more flesh and blood to our political consciousness but also facilitated a lot of social challenges invoking rise of fake news, misinforming blogs, social bullying, hate speeches, inciting words and most importantly threats to tribal unity and state sovereignty. These social challenges were foreseen in the early evolving years of media in 18th/19th century and proper legislations were Introduced in 19th century coupled with more balanced legislations in the 20th century opening more doors for freedom of speech. Like i asked above, “how free is freedom of speech itself”, Are we not pawns in the machinations of the media and the political elites?. The intimidating entry of Twitter, Facebook, Instagram etc in Nigeria has shaped many aspects of our political and social landscape in the swiftest manner but we can’t be too excited to shy away from the consuming challenges of “deliberate fake news, social media bullying, deliberate and sponsored misinformations and most importantly less discovered data breaches and immoral commercialization of sensational reports in quest for traffic on news sites and blogs”. The 2020 Corona virus pandemic has shown more of our political and social vulnerabilities to unchecked social media irrespective of our biases.

“Self-regulation or government regulation”?.

Furthermore, many have called for “self regulation” of social media especially in developing countries with special and understandable bias for social media being the most independent and transparent channel of information and awareness. In view of this thought, there are many examples that can be cited to prove the declining transparency or less transparency of the internet/social media space. The Cambridge Analytica scandal remains fresh despite less investigation of the mention of Nigeria in the scandal amassing data of Facebook users for “political purposes” without the explicit consent of users. The last presidential election held in America also exposed us to a lot of complexities less known about the extensive Influences of social media which deem it less transparent. The last election in America gave rise to questions to roles of countries in using “social media machinations” to manipulate, exploit or Influence to say the least. The natural rule of “survival of the fittest” has prompted the traditional media outlets to adopt internet and social media based approaches in reporting and marketing. Hunger for profits through traffic has pushed a lot of respected traditional media outlets to be “unnecessarily sensational” coupled with blogs sponsoring false, fake and malicious reports to target vulnerable audience. It should be known that beyond commercial pursuits, there are political and social consequences to this.

Still, on the path of social media self regulation question, countries with more robust and advanced democratic practices are recently depicting pro-regulation body languages in respect of social media. Facebook, which owns Instagram, told Reality Check it has more than 35,000 people around the world working on safety and security, and it also releases statistics on its content removals. Between July and September 2019 it took action on 30.3 million pieces of content of which it found 98.4% before any users flagged it. According to BBC, YouTube releases a transparency report, which gives data on its removals of inappropriate content.

The video-sharing site owned by Google said that 8.8m videos were taken down between July and September 2019, with 93% of them automatically removed by machines, and two thirds of those clips not receiving a single view.

It also removed 3.3 million channels and 517 million comments. Despite all these self regulatory actions “Germany’s NetzDG law came into effect at the beginning of 2018, applying to companies with more than two million registered users in the country. They were forced to set up procedures to review complaints about content they were hosting, remove anything that was clearly illegal within 24 hours and publish updates every six months about how they were doing.”  U.K.’s telecommunications watchdog, OFCOM, intends to enforce a “duty of care” on companies such as Facebook and Twitter “to protect users from harmful and illegal terrorist and child abuse content.” Firms that allow harmful material to flourish or don’t remove it quickly could be sanctioned. Ofcom currently keeps tabs on radio and television broadcasters, and has the power to levy fines or even kick repeat offenders off the air. Countries like China and Russia have shown more stricter measures on social media especially as they concern political opinions and decisions but the most noteworthy is that of established “pro-democracy” Western countries with rooted history in freedom of speech now seeing needs for more control of the social media coupled with efforts to make them more taxable and worthy of sanctions.  Also in Australia, in reaction to the suicide of a well known TV presenter Charlotte Dawson due to depression arising from cyber bullying, the government Introduced legislations enforcing fines €285,000 and take down notices.

“Any alternative to the proposed Social media bill”?

In light of above mentioned inferences. Facebook founder, Mark Zuckerberg in one opinion piece in The Washington Post, he said “government and regulators rather than private companies like Facebook should be more active in policing the internet.” Twitter Chief Executive Jack Dorsey also supported the views of Mark Zuckerberg especially as it relates to data protection regulation in the EU. The opinions of these critical stakeholders are enough to give validity to debates in respect of social media regulation in Nigeria despite fears and paranoia. The alternative solution to be rendered in establishing more balanced Social media regulation in Nigeria will favour self-regulation and government regulation. I am recommending that in respect of self regulation, all publishing bloggers must be certified by a registered Professional bloggers association in pursuit of standardizing blogging in Nigeria and to enable fake news publishers, hate speech Influencers and order unethical conducts to be ascertained and checked by the association granting it more Independence to online publishers and bloggers beyond government control. The second model of social media regulation is the “pro-government regulation” deeming it worthy for the government to Introduce more responsibilities to social media companies and owners of online publishing sites to be more “liable” and not shifting responsibilities or liability to users, inability of such organisations from checking fake news, hateful contents, deliberate misinformations and privacy policy breaches will not only attract fines but “blacklisting” internet activities in the country till they comply.

Conclusively, being mindful of anti-free speech tendencies of African leaders as feasible in Zimbabwe, Ethiopia, Kenya, Cameroon, Uganda etc shouldn’t also blindfold us from the approaching disasters of unchecked/unregulated social media. We should all crave for a balanced solution irrespective of our biases against the political elites because we are also pawns to media machinations. The writer is not in favour of the notorious “social media bill” of Nigeria specifically but calling for a balanced regulation which is totally unavoidable at this crucial moment of our threatened statehood.

Mujib Dada-Qadri is a Lawyer and Policy Analyst., Email: dadamujeeb1@gmail.com Facebook: Mujib Dada-Qadri