Published 2nd Jun, 2021

By Socrates Mbamalu

Twitter has deleted a tweet by General Muhammadu Buhari which called for violence on the Igbo citing the Civil War as an example of what could happen.

The tweet which was made on Tuesday during a press briefing with the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) captured what Buhari said at the briefing.

Buhari was addressing the destruction of INEC offices and had said, “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.”

During the two and half years of the war, between 500,000 and 2 million Biafran civilians are estimated to have died of starvation.

The statement by Buhari which came barely some days after a sit-at-home instruction by the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) in celebration of the heros and heroines of the Biafra War was compared to the messaging used when addressing bandits.

Twitter requires that a tweet is removed if it violated Twitter Rules. The violator is required to remove the tweet before they can post again.

Residents in some of the South East states have reported on how young boys were taken from their hostels in the university and labeled IPOB supporters. In another video that went viral, a group of men were led out of church by the military and Nigeria Police, highlighting a major issue that the actions of IPOB could gain more strength with human rights abuses on civilians by government agencies.

Twitter had earlier in the year chosen Ghana as its preferred location for its Africa headquarters. Twitter had explained that it had chose Ghana because it was a champion of democracy, a supporter of free speech, online freedom, and the Open Internet.

Share on Social Media