The Federal Government has kicked against the judgement delivered against it by the ECOWAS court over the right of Nigerians to use the microbloging platform.
The Nigerian Government has, therefore, told the ECOWAS court that it lacked the jurisdiction to criminalise the suspension of Twitter in Nigeria.
This was coming after the court restrained the Federal Government from unlawfully imposing sanctions or harass, intimidate, arrest or prosecute Twitter and/or any other social media service provider(s), media houses, radio and television broadcast stations, the Plaintiffs and other Nigerians who are Twitter users, pending the hearing and determination of this suit.”
The Federal Government has now reacted in a preliminary objection filed to challenge the suit by Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) and 176 concerned Nigerians over its directive to prosecute those violating the suspension.
The Federal Government argued that the court lacks the jurisdiction to “determine the criminalisation of an act under Nigerian laws”.
It said Twitter is a microblogging site, and not “an organisation of any member state”.
