Social Media Regulation And Free Speech By Carl Umegboro – TheNigerialawyer

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) which was
proclaimed by the United Nations’ General Assembly in 1948, and
adopted as the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights 1981 is
a milestone document in the history of human rights.

Accordingly, Nigeria as a member nation domesticated it as
chapter 4 of the 1999 Constitution, Federal Republic of Nigeria as
amended. Amongst them is the right to freedom of expressions and
the press enshrined in Section 39 of the Constitution.

Section 39(1) provides, “Every person shall be entitled to
freedom of expression, including freedom to hold opinions and to
receive and impart ideas and information without interference”.
Subsection 2 expansively provides, “Without prejudice to the
generality of subsection (1) of this section, every person shall be
entitled to own, establish and operate any medium for the
dissemination of information, ideas and opinions”.

On the other hand, the Criminal Code (Laws of the Federation –
1990) criminalized provoking breach of peace by offensive
publication in Part 2.  Section 88A (1)(b) provides, “Any
person who publishes or circulates publications either in the form
of newspapers, or leaflets, periodicals, pamphlets or posters, if
such publications are likely to provoke or bring into disaffection
any section of the country shall be guilty of an offence…”
Similarly in subsection (1)(c).

Emphatically, the Criminal Code includes sedition as an offence
under the law. Section 51(1) provides, “Any person who – (b) utters
any seditious words; (c) prints, publishes, sells, offers for sale,
distribute or reproduce any seditious publication; shall be guilty
of an offence ….., and any seditious publication shall be forfeited
to the State”.

By the way, what is sedition?  It simply means organized or
deliberate incitement of rebellion or civil disorder against
authority or the state, usually by speech or writing.

In R v Sullivan (1961) US 254, the word ‘sedition’ was described
as, “a comprehensive term which embraces all practices, whether by
word, deed or writing, which are calculated to disturb the
tranquility of the State”.  And in IGP v Anagbogu (1954) 21
NLR 26, it was held that the act of writing an article with a
seditious intention is tantamount to the offence of sedition.

Now, the crux of the matter is whether the right to freedom of
expression and press is an absolute or qualified right? Under
permissible circumstances such as is necessarily expedient for
public order and security, arguably, freedom of expression and the
press cannot be absolute rights instead must be exercised with
restraint subject to law.

Article 29 (2) of the UDHR 1948 provides, “In the exercise of
these rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such
limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of
securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of
others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public
order and general welfare in a democratic society”.

Synchronically, Section 45 (1) of the1999 CFRN provides,
“Nothing in sections 37, 38, 39, 40, and 41 of this Constitution
shall invalidate any law that is reasonably justifiable in a
democratic society (a) in the interest of defence, public safety,
public order, public morality or public health; or (b) for the
purpose of protecting the rights and freedom of other persons”.

In the civil jurisprudence, the freedom of expressions and the
press, interestingly, are constrained by libel and slander.
Logically, freedom of speech is not an unconditional right.

The right to life, for example can be encumbered by judicial
death sentence; right to free movement can be hindered by lawful
arrests and jail terms, and the right to own movable property
cannot be exercised by theft or stealing. Ditto on others. In other
words, human rights are fundamental but not absolute rights.

Suffice to say that putting restraints on social media
activities through regulations cannot fairly lead to brouhahas.
Events in recent times have shown that such intervention is
indispensable, and without regulations, social media will do more
harm than good to the society in no distant time.

Overtime, sensitive information including falsified national
reports and private issues had been disseminated only for people to
subsequently discover there were fake news. This is
condemnable.

If the established media industry; audio, visual and print-media
outlets with trained journalists are regulated, why should there be
uproars on regulations on social media with unskilled operators?
Likewise, sim-cards must be compulsorily registered and
intermittently updated to assist in the onerous battle.

Any society where people can freely fabricate falsehoods
including invasive information and disseminate to the public is in
decays, and therefore must not be encouraged to stay. Nonetheless,
citizens have unparalleled rights to fairly criticize their leaders
and governments on policies at any time.

Instructively, the quality of criticisms determine if
oppositions are actually in existence. There is a wide difference
between criticisms and incitingly feeding the people with
falsehoods. No doubt, civilization opened up the world of
innovations but mustn’t be subjected to extreme abuse, otherwise,
it will tear the nation in pieces.

In sum, a situation where disgruntled elements would fabricate
fake stories or videos to mislead the public is dangerous. It’s a
threat to national security, and sensibly, cannot be permissible
under the guise of exercising right to free speech and press.

Umegboro is a public affairs analyst and Associate,
Chartered Institute of Arbitrators (United Kingdom). 08023184542 –
SMS only.  Https:carlumegboro.com