Governor Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna State has called for the enactment
of a legal framework to ensure the expeditious prosecution of
purveyors of fake news and hate speech, while commending the Minister
of Information and Culture for being in the vanguard of the fight
against the twin evils.
The governor made the remarks in Kaduna on Thursday when he received
the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, on a
courtesy visit, on the sidelines of the 47th National Council on
Information, with the theme “TACKLING FAKE NEWS AND HATE SPEECH TO
ENHANCE PEACE AND NATIONAL UNITY”.
He said because of the challenges posed by fake news and hate speech,
the Kaduna State Government is establishing a legal framework, beyond
the Penal Code, that recognizes the peculiarities of spreading fake
news and hate speech with the use of technology.
“We have fundamental problems Your Excellency. First, we need to give
state governments and state high courts the jurisdiction to try this
because the Federal Government cannot do it alone.
“What we are thinking of doing in Kaduna State is to enact our own
legislation against fake news and so on. Right now we have enough in
the Penal Code to try people that do that but we need a stronger
framework that recognizes the technologies and the processes that are
used now more than ever,” he said.
El-Rufai commended the NCI for adopting the menace of fake news
as its theme and recommended that State Governments should be given
broader jurisdiction to try offenders, thus putting the states at the
forefront of the campaign against fake news and hate speech.
The governor, who commended the minister
for launching the National Campaign Against Fake News, urged state
governments to emulate the campaign.
“This is a very important issue that you are discussing, Honourable
Minister, and I think the programme you launched against fake news in
all the Federal Government media is quite commendable and should be
sustained.
”But beyond that, what we found here in Kaduna State is that the
Cyber Crime Act, which is the one that provides a framework for
prosecuting people that use Social Media to proliferate fake news,
vests jurisdiction in the Federal High Court, so we cannot easily and
quickly prosecute those involved, so we have to rely on the Penal
Code,” he said.
In his remarks, the minister said fake news has become the most potent
weapon in the arsenal of the political opposition, in view of their
inability to take on the Administration because of its great
achievements in all spheres.
“Your Excellency, you would have noticed in recent times that fake
news has been on the increase and this is very simple, because the
opposition cannot debate the federal government on issues. We
challenge the opposition to debate us on the achievements we have made
in agriculture, security, economy or in fighting corruption, but they
could not do that. Rather, they have found out that their most potent
weapon is fake news and hate speech.
“We have it on good authority that the opposition has engaged
consultants from other parts of the world, whose only duty is to churn
out fake news at intervals and confuse the gullible,” he said.
Mohammed, however, said that despite resorting to the use of
fake news and hate speech, the opposition’s campaign is not gaining
traction because Nigerians have seen through their lies ahead of next
year’s elections.
