Nigeria announced on Friday it was suspending Twitter operations in the country, saying the platform was being used for activities "capable of undermining Nigeria's corporate existence."
Information Minister Lai Mohammed said the government made the move because of "the persistent use of the platform for activities that are capable of undermining Nigeria's corporate existence".
"The Federal Government has suspended, indefinitely, the operations of the microblogging and social networking service, Twitter, in Nigeria," said a statement issued by the Federal Ministry of Information and Culture.
The ban on Twitter, notably, comes two days after the microblogging site deleted an "abusive" tweet of Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari, and suspended his account for 12 hours. Buhari's post threatening to punish groups blamed for attacks on government buildings was removed for violating Twitter's "abusive behaviour" policy, the company said on Wednesday.
Twitter was still working in Nigeria soon after Friday's statement. When asked about the decision, ministry special assistant Segun Adeyemi told AFP: "I can't answer technicalities... operations will be suspended indefinitely."
