The activities of Nigerians on the social media are now being monitored for hate speech, anti-government and anti-security information by the military.
Director of Defence Information, Major-General John Enenche, told Channels
Television that the move became necessary in the light of troubling activities
and misinformation capable of jeopardizing the unity of the country.
His comments come less than 48 hours after President
Muhammadu Buhari said in his national broadcast that some of the discussion on
social media in his absence crossed the line and left him distressed.
For Major General Enenche, the social media has always
been a challenge all over the world and for the military, it is no different.
“It is a double-edged sword and we are also having a bit
of it,” he said when he appeared on Channels Television’s News At 10, hours
after President Buhari met with service chiefs and ordered them to strengthen
their operations.
“Imagine when the President came back and addressed the
nation, not up to 30 minutes later, a fake speech of the Commander-In-Chief was
being circulated in order to do what? To derail the people. If you are not very
sharp and if you didn’t listen to the speech or you don’t have a copy of it
like I had it almost immediately, you wouldn’t know. So, looking at it from
that perspective, it is a challenge everywhere.”
Having observed the possibility that the social media can
be misused the military has taken steps to address that. One of such steps is
the establishment of strategic media centres.
“What are we doing? In the military, we are now taking on
it more seriously than ever. We have our strategic media centres that monitor
the social media to be able to sieve out and react to all the ones that will be
anti-government, be anti-military, (and) be anti-security,” the military chief
continued.
“We tackle them appropriately with appropriate responses.
Ahead of that, we are also proactive. We have measures in place, scientific
measures to be able to sieve this information and also to get the public and
let them know that some of this information they are getting is not genuine are
not true and their objective is an anti-corporate existence of this country.”
There has been a rise in attacks by Boko Haram
terrorists and it is one of the things the President advised the service chiefs
to check. While the military intends to do just that, Major General Enenche
said what they terrorists are doing is not surprising.
He said, “Like I have said before, it is not unexpected
being that they have been degraded, decimated and really busted at camp zero
and other cities there through the air bombardment and raids by members of the
military, particularly the army. So you will see them spreading out like ants
that have been busted from an anthill.”
According to him, the terrorists have benefitted in their
attacks from the unending collaboration by insiders and sympathisers among the
residents in the North East.
“However, I want to assure the general public and
Nigerians that measures are in place to begin to take on them and begin to take
them out. However highly placed anyone is or any insider or collaborator is, we
are on top of the situation and we are beginning to get our information to
begin to handle them appropriately,” he said.
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Source: channelstv.com
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