- DHQ spokesman Enenche says the military
lacks power to arrest those making hate
speeches on social media
- He said the military would only monitor
social media and do a threat analysis but not
arrest for hate speeches
- Enenche said the military has already
created a social media monitor centre that is
doing the job
The military has said it will not arrest
anybody who makes hate speeches on
social media because it is not empowered
by law to do so.
This bit of information was made public by
the director of defence information Major
General John Enenche, in an interview on
Channels TV on Thursday, August 31.
Enenche said the military had no plans to
arrest anyone that makes anti-military or
anti-government comments on social media
as was widely believed.
According to him, the military was just
going to monitor happenings on the social
media and nothing more.
Enenche said: “There was nothing like that.
We do not have power to arrest people for
hate speeches. It is just false assertion,
against the military, and against my humble
self that I said that we will be arresting
people or checkmating people. The military
is not going to be monitoring hate
speeches.
“Did I tell you hate speech in your
recordings? We have a strategic media
centre, our strategic media centre monitors
the media, simple. And it is like that all over
the world.
And we take that because it helps us to
transform the nature of the intelligence to
enable us to prepare for whatever call up
we get to ensure security in this country.
“Let me tell you and tell the public without
fear of anybody; we are trained to do threat
analysis of anything that would threaten the
security of this country. So, it is part of our
threat analysis."
He added: “Any person can interpret it to
mean that it is a follow up to the speech of
the Vice-President (Yemi Osinbajo), the then
Acting President and then the minister of
interior; then that person can be right.”
“Where do we take instruction from, where
do we get information from? It is part of
what is called threat analysis.”
NAIJ.com had earlier reported that the
Nigerian military had begun monitoring
social media
to identify peddlers of fake news, anti-
government and anti-security activities in
the country.
The new development comes just days after
it was disclosed by Major-General John
Enenche, Director of Defence Information
during an interview session on Channels
Television’s News at 10 and a live broadcast
delivered by President Muhammadu Buhari.

https://www.naij.com/1123271-military-arrest-people-hate-speeches-social-media.html

But Police can arrest.

So the military will simply submit it's threats analysis to the Police and DSS to effect arrest.

Hence it's one and same as arresting people for hate speech.

The arrest of those who make hate speeches is by no means bad but what troubles some of us is weather this legislation would not be abused by government and her agencies.

Again the line between what is truthful speech and hate speech should be cleared marked