A civic group, the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP), has vowed to sue President Muhammadu Buhari over the reintroduction of the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) Act amendment bill.
An online newspaper, TheCable had, on Tuesday, reported that Lai Mohammed, Minister of Information and culture, was planning to reintroduce the NBC Act amendment bill as an executive bill in the National Assembly.
The bill seeks to empower the commission to regulate social media, internet broadcasting, fix tariffs for pay television services, among other functions.
The proposed amendment also seeks to confer on the NBC and investigative agencies the power to request for personal information of social media users with or without court orders.
It also seeks to compel social media platforms to release such user information as requested by the NBC or investigative agencies within a period of seven days.
The bill states that the commission or investigative agency “may in the face of imminent danger” request the personal information of a user of any social media platform.
In this context, the commission does not need a court order to request user information.
Reacting, SERAP in a post on its Twitter handle on Friday said it will sue the Buhari administration.
“President Buhari must immediately rescind his reported approval for security agencies to access people’s personal details via NIN-SIM linkage without due process of law,” the tweet read.
“This is an attack on our rights to privacy and dignity. We’re suing to challenge this illegality.”
