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Hate Speech law is a throwback to Decree 4 —Group

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President Buhari

Veteran Nigerian columnists under the auspices of League of Nigerian Columnists (LNC) have raised their voices in condemnation of what they said was an attempt by the President Muhammadu Buhari led All Progressives Congress’ (APC) government to use hate speech legislation to jail critics, warning that such portend danger for the country’s democracy.

They recalled the days of Decree 4 enacted by the Gen. Buhari regime in 1984 which prohibited journalists from publishing any material that could embarrass a public officer. It was the worst anti-press law in the country under which two journalists of the Guardian newspapers, Tunde Thompson and Nduka Irabor were jailed.

The columnists who stated this at the inaugural lecture of the LNC titled: “Hate Speech,” held fortnight ago, at the Centre for International Studies, Adekunle Fajuyi Crescent, Ikeja condemned the arrest of activist, Deji Adeyanju and his colleagues by the Nigerian police, noting that the allegation of hate speech levelled against them by the force was untenable.

In his opening remarks, convener of the league and former Managing Director of Daily Times of Nigeria, Akogun Tola Adeniyi, asserted that Nigeria was at crossroads, as according to him, political leaders who are aware that they have failed the people are increasingly manipulating the country’s fault lines to divert attention from the real issues.

“As 2019 election approaches our national augury has never been staggered. The country is at crossroads as the nation’s fault lines is callously manipulated by leaders for self-serving purposes,” Adeniyi said. “The vicious primordial cleavers that have held our nation down are being cynically exploited by those who profiteer from the crisis of confidence so engendered.”

He said the emergence of the league was informed by the need for strong voices in the media to speak out in the face of the numerous challenges Nigeria now faces, warning that the country was verge of collapse.

“Without sounding alarmist, Nigeria is on the precipice. This is a time of great uncertainty. At critical moments, the league shall make its position known as we shall continue to drum to the ears of our leaders, various segments and sectors of the society that things must be done right. This is one of those critical moments.

“In this our very first outing, we chose the topic hate speech carefully and advisedly. We believe that any speech which attacks a person or group on the basis of attributes such as race, religion, ethnicity, nationality, disability or gender identity, and predisposes them to acts of violence is an evil wind particularly in the country that is already in tenterhooks. Hate speech is the most potent, for that can push the country off the edge and into the abyss.”

Adeniyi accused the APC administration of being the originators of hate speeches, warning that signing the hate speech bill into law was geared towards gagging the press as well as critics of the administration.

“Hate speech originated from the current government, the unitary government that we run at the centre. Signing the hate speech bill into law is geared towards gagging the press and those who want to draw attention to the deficiency of this government, the failing of this government, which is very obvious. They do not want people to speak against them. But we Nigerians will refuse that kind of nonsensical legislation,” he maintained.

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Chairman of the day, Professor Anya O. Anya in his own remarks, regretted that Nigeria had become a very embattled country where blood flows in different parts with little done to curtail it. He noted that hate speech has emerged as one of the ills of the modern society.

“Hate speech or alternative facts, these are the new appellation that has emerged in the discussion of human affairs in this decade. What is common in all that is the fact that they recognise the absence of  truth. And what is truth? Truth is what can be corroborated and can be verified,” Anya said.

“But our country is embattled. I have never seen this country in my 82 years as embattled as it is today. A few weeks ago, I was with Christopher Kolade. Occasionally we exchange ideas about what is going on. And we looked at the front page of newspapers for that particular day. There were seven different stories there, none was positive; all were negative.

“That, in a sense, tells you where we are. If you take any Nigerian newspaper, you will be assailed by the blood that is being shed all over the country. It’s no longer a matter of the North East; it is now in the Middle Belt as it in the Niger Delta.”

Anya said it was time to redefine the, as according to him, it had become obvious that the present arrangement is not working.

“We are living through unnatural and uncertain times. But I believe that this is temporary. It is a time of redefinition; it’s a time that we have to define who we are, what we are and where we want to go,” he said.

In his speech, the keynote speaker, Mr. Dan Agbese condemned the arrest of Deji Adeyanju, noting that the action of the police has shown that there is the danger of people who have poor understanding of what hate speech bill is meant to achieve, using it to perpetrate assault on people’s basic freedoms.

“Ladies and gentlemen, danger lies in the nearby corner here, in the generally limited understanding of hate speeches in our country at the moment. We allow the interpretation of this law to be determined by an individual’s poor understanding of it, there could be a grievous assault on freedom of speech by overzealous security agents,” he said.

“Only last week, the Nigerian Police arrested Deji Adeyanju, convener of the civil society group called Concerned Nigerians and two of his colleagues for what the police termed hate speech. Their alleged offence was their posting this in the public space: that the romance between APC and the police is unholy. That police is not a department of APC. We just want the police to be neutral.

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“The alacrity with which the Force reacted to this and immediately became the judge and jury in their own tenuous case is the sign of that danger that we now face,” he regretted.

Agbese accused the police of ignorance, and warned that there is need to be careful as according to him, there might be an attempt to deny Nigerians freedom of speech.

“We must be careful here because reaction such as this, born out of ignorance on the part of state actors, could endanger one of the most cherished freedoms in a democracy… the freedom of speech,” he said.

“We must ensure that those who are minded to act on hate speech understand what it actually means; and are able to make an informed distinction between a hate speech and a robust expression of opinions deemed by those who express them as their contributions to national discourse.

“What Mr. Adeyanju and his colleagues said were as far from hate speech as hell is, I would imagine, from heaven.”

Quoting Wikipedia’s definition of hate speech, he said: “Hate speech is speech that attacks a person or groups on the basis of attributes such as race, religion, ethnic origin, national origin, sex, disability, sexual orientation or gender identity.”

He further noted that, “This is a very broad definition indeed, and it is quite easy for one to be caught in the trap. But a speech that attacks persons or groups, but not on the basis of those attributes, will be accepted as merely robust, but essentially harmless expressions.

“Columnists therefore, need not fear that they are being asked not to call a spade by its real name. The foot soldiers of anti hate speech may be asking Nigerians to “submit themselves and their sacred fundamental human rights to gagging. I hope not gentlemen. The Wikipedia definition of hate speech is robust enough, but it doesn’t cover the entire grounds now claimed by the proponents of the anti hate speech legislation.”

Speaking, one of the discussants, Mr. Innocent Chukwuma, Regional Director, West Africa of Ford Foundation, noted that hate speech was a very serious problem in the country and should be tackled in a robust manner and not used as a tool against opposition.

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“Hate speech is a very serious matter in our society today,” he said. “Just about a week ago, the Friedman Journalism Lab and Harvard University released a report of the study they did in Nigeria, Kenya and South East, looking at how exposed members of the public in these three countries were in relation to hate speech, fake news and what have you. And they came out with findings that suggest that we should take these matters seriously.

“It says that in these three countries, more than a quarter of the people they interviewed agree that they have deliberately contributed in disseminating information they knew were false, hateful and malicious. So it’s not a case of people who didn’t know purveying what they didn’t know. Which raises the question about why are they doing it. It must speak to something they believe as individuals or as groups.”

Chukwuma accused politicians who have failed to live up to expectations of fueling hate speeches in order to divert attention from the real issues of governance as they seek reelection.

“Why is it particularly around election period that we seem to witness an upsurge in hate speech, fake news and all of that?” he queried.

“The literature of hate mongering during election suggests that it’s actually during elections that politicians feel that they could not, on the basis of their achievements in office, canvass support that they start sending things that are meant to divide so that people may not have the unity of purpose in questioning them about what they are doing. And that should get us to think.”

Also speaking, another veteran columnist, Mr. Ray Ekpu, a founding member of the Newswatch magazine, and CEO, said hate speech and hate mongering have wreaked havoc in the country. Citing the example of the Asaba massacre during the civil war, he described hate speech and fake news of having the potential to set the country aflame.

“One example of what this hate speech can do is the killing of the people of Asaba during the civil war. These people didn’t know that the soldiers that came were harbouring hatred for them. They dressed and went out to the village square to welcome them. And the soldiers led by the late General Murtala Mohammed separated the men from the women and started killing them one after the other,” he said.

“This was a concoction, cocktail between hate speech and fake news. That’s a very inflammable cocktail. And that’s how over one thousand Nigerians of Asaba origin where massacred. So, it has this potential, either fake news or hate speech, of setting societies aflame.

“I was worried last year when these youths from the North met in Kaduna and said the Igbo are this are that, if they want Biafra, they should go out of Nigeria, that they will not be welcomed in the North. They put Nigeria on tenterhooks. And of course, the “Biafrans” also responded in kind. They returned the favour by saying, well, all Northerners in our territory must also leave.

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“These are clear examples of hate speech. But it is not really easy to define hate speech. That is why people around the world say maybe that’s the way many governments around the world that do not cherish robust criticism want to use it to stop people from expressing dissent.

“And that is also why you don’t have many countries that have specific legislation for hate speech. There are about 22 out of 200 countries that have specific legislation on hate speech. That tells you that one, it is either those countries already have legislation that take care of something that is close to hate speech or hate speech itself.

Ekpu accused officials of the Buhari government of making hate speeches with respect to the way they have responded to the killing of Nigerians by herdsmen, noting that the administration has turned out to be the key promoters of hate speech.

“In Nigeria, we have had situations that came close to hate speech. The problem between herdsmen and farmers is serious. So many people have been killed because of this crisis. And then you have a government official saying, ‘You know, you must release your land to these people if you don’t want to be killed, let them use it to rear their cattle.’

“These are private people doing their own private business who should use money and buy land to do the business, but you are asking other private persons who are doing their business of farming to give their lands free to these people in order to save yourselves from being killed. Isn’t that hate speech?” he wondered.

“You then go to the state where people have been killed, and you say to them, “Well, don’t cry too much, you have actually killed more people than they have killed your own people.” That is hate speech in my view.

 

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