Human rights activist and publisher of SaharaReporters, Omoyele Sowore, has filed a suit at the Federal High Court in Abuja against the Department of State Services (DSS), Meta Platforms Inc. (owners of Facebook), and X Corp. (formerly Twitter), accusing them of attempting to unlawfully censor his social media accounts.
In the suit, filed through his lawyer, Tope Temokun, Mr Sowore asked the court to restrain the DSS from directing global platforms to delete his posts, including one in which he described President Bola Tinubu as a “criminal.”
“These suits were filed to challenge unconstitutional censorship initiated by the DSS against Sowore’s accounts maintained with Meta and X,” Mr Temokun said in a statement on Tuesday. “This is about the survival of free speech in Nigeria. If state agencies can dictate to global platforms who may speak and what may be said, then no Nigerian is safe.”
The lawyer argued that censorship of political criticism violates Section 39 of the 1999 Constitution, which guarantees freedom of expression.
“No security agency, no matter how powerful, can suspend or delete those rights,” he said, adding that social media companies must not “become complicit in unlawful suppression of liberty.”
The suit seeks declarations that the DSS has no legal authority to censor Nigerians online, that Meta and X must not allow their platforms to be used as instruments of repression, and that Mr Sowore’s rights—and those of other citizens—be protected from interference.
“This struggle is not about personalities,” the statement continued. “It is about principle. And we shall resist every attempt to turn Nigeria into a digital dictatorship.”
Context
Mr Sowore, a former presidential candidate, has frequently clashed with security agencies over his criticism of successive Nigerian governments.
Earlier on Tuesday, SaharaReporters reported that the DSS filed a five-count charge against him at the Federal High Court, accusing him of defaming Mr Tinubu through social media posts.
The charges, filed on 16 September by the Director of Public Prosecutions at the Federal Ministry of Justice, allege that the posts were false, defamatory, and capable of causing public disorder, in violation of provisions of the Cybercrimes Amendment Act, 2024.
The DSS had also written to Meta and X, demanding that Mr Sowore’s posts be deleted and his accounts deactivated. The agency claimed the posts were “false, malicious, and inciting,” warning of legal action if the platforms failed to act.
Mr Sowore, however, refused to comply, insisting that his statements are part of his constitutional duty to hold leaders accountable.
No date has yet been fixed for the hearing of either the suit filed by Mr Sowore or the charges brought against him by the DSS.
