So yesterday made it 200 days since Nigeria famously banned the use of Twitter as a social media platform among its citizens. In this period of time, the Nigerian economy has been estimated to have lost over ₦500 billion.

I was supposed to post this article yesterday but I was very tired yesterday so I slept off before I could finish writing it.

Moving on...

If you can remember clearly, on June 4th, 2021, the Nigerian government placed a ban on the use of Twitter, after a tweet posted by the President of Nigeria, Muhammadu Buhari was deleted by the social media platform. Telecommunications companies in Nigeria the next day, blocked access to Twitter after being given directives by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) to that effect.

According to the estimates given by the NetBlocks Cost of Shutdown Tool, Nigeria’s economy loses ₦104.02m ($250,600) every hour to the ban on Twitter. It has been 4,800 hours (200 days) since the social networking site was blocked.

During his Independence day speech, the President stated that the Twitter ban in Nigeria would continue until Twitter registered in Nigeria and had a physical presence in Nigeria and representation in the country.

Just recently, the Minister of state for Labour and Employment, Mr. Festus Keyamo said that Twitter had agreed to meet the conditions set by the Nigerian government so as to end their period of suspension in the nation.

The Minister, who is part of the committee set up by the President to discuss with Twitter over this period of suspension stated that, "The reason why Twitter was banned in Nigeria was not to tamper with the use of Twitter among Nigerians or to drive them away but instead to try and restructure our relationship with Twitter."

Financial planner, Kalu Aja said that the Twitter ban in Nigeria raises questions and concerns about doing business and making investments in Nigeria and not the good kind of questions to be precise.

"Specifically Twitter and many other social media platforms allow for businesses especially small businesses and sole-proprietorships to carry out there plans with zero marketing budget because it is a place where they can expand and grow their businesses at no cost, all they need is a smartphone to communicate and build a brand."

It's very obvious that the longer this Twitter ban lasts, the more harm it will do to the Nigerian economy as millions of Naira are being lost daily due to this issue. Doing business in Nigeria has been made hard by the crypto ban and has only gotten worse with this Twitter ban. Hopefully the government speed up this dialogue and lift the suspension of Twitter in Nigeria.

Anyway we Nigerians are creative so we found a way to maneuver the system and make it work. Even big artiste like Wizkid still posts on twitter. If you noticed, some of all these my recent posts has a screenshot of twitter in it. Though we can't be as active as before but either way we will make it work until it's available.

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Thank you for reading.

Merry Christmas in advance.