Head of the Department of Mass Communication, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, UNN, Dr. Edith Ugochi Ohaja, has described the proposed bill seeking to place the death penalty on anyone convicted of hate speech to a time bomb on the journalism profession in Nigeria.
Ohaja, in an interview, said she could not believe that the National Assembly (NASS) was deliberating on a bill that provided for capital punishment for the expression of opinions, and described it a total misplacement of priorities.
She challenged Journalists in Nigeria to rise up to the occasion and prove that the Nigerian media which stood firm during General Sani Abacha led military regime is still alive to defend justice, truth and human rights.
“This is a country where rampaging herdsmen, bandits, kidnappers, and terrorists seem to be treated with kid gloves. One would have called this a misplacement of priorities if the move wasn’t so sinister and it speaks to the baseness of the current National Assembly.
“By reviving this bill and seeking to set up a whole agency for so-called hate speech, the government is no longer hiding its dictatorial inclinations. Besides the social media, blogs, and citizen journalism websites, traditional media remain the platforms for publicizing people’s expressions of opinions and helping them to gain traction. So they will be prime targets or those whose views are publicized in them will be.
“I don’t know the full provisions of the bill but I imagine there will be punitive fines against corporate bodies, like the media, that are seen as fora for the dissemination of “hate speech”.
“The sad thing in Nigeria is that the media have not been robust enough in withstanding the tyranny of the present regime. Perhaps, the revival of this bill will serve as a wakeup call to them that the government is trampling on everyone’s rights and eroding freedom of the press.
“In fact, this might be the time for the media to redeem their image by championing the resistance against this kind of move and other obnoxious policies of this government. In the time of Abacha, they did it. Hopefully, the recent years of questionable democracy have not turned them into a hopelessly complacent and conniving lot”, the don said.
Speaking further, Ohaja said, “The level of ineptitude, sectionalism and other multifarious failings of the government are constantly drawing public ire and that is why the government is desperate to muzzle free expression of ideas and opinions. And the hypocrisy is glaring because it is the executive arm of government and the judiciary it has kept under its thumb that will decide what is hate speech and who to prosecute.
She urged Nigerians to resist the passage of this bill as it will kill what is left of the country’s fledgling democracy.
