EFFECT OF TWITTER BAN ON TELECOMMUNICATION COMPANIES IN NIGERIA
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EFFECT OF TWITTER BAN ON TELECOMMUNICATION COMPANIES IN NIGERIA
INTRODUCTION
Background of the study
The telecommunications (telecom) market is part of the information and communication technology sector. The market is largely concerned with operating and providing access to facilities for the transmission of voice, data, text, and video (Businesswire, 2016).
Telecommunication is the transfer of information via wire, radio, optical, or other electromagnetic networks (ITU 2015). It originated from humans’ urge to communicate.
According to the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), 97% of the world’s population lived within range of a mobile cellular signal, and 93% was within range of a 3G (or higher) network. In the Americas, Asia-Pacific, and Europe, more than 95% of the population is served by a 3G or higher mobile broadband network.
The percentage is 91% in the Arab States, 88% in the Commonwealth of Independent States, and 79% in Africa. Of the 85 nations having data on mobile phone ownership, 61 had a higher proportion of males than women (ITU, 2019).
However, since the introduction of GSM in Nigeria, total active subscriptions have increased significantly. According to the Nigeria Communication Commission (2020), there were 184,699,409 active voice subscribers in Q4 2019, compared to 179,176,930 in Q3 2019 and 172,824,239 in Q4 2018.
Voice subscriptions increased by 3.08% quarter over quarter and 6.87% year over year. Similarly, 126,078,999 internet subscribers were active, compared to 123,163,027 in Q3 2019 and 112,065,740 in Q4 2018. This marked a 2.37% increase in internet subscriptions from quarter to quarter and a 12.50% increase year on year.
However, confusion surrounded this key industry of Nigeria when the Federal Government issued an official ban on Twitter. Twitter is an American microblogging and social networking service where users can post and engage with messages known as “tweets”. Registered users can post, like, and retweet tweets; unregistered users can simply read them.
Users can access Twitter via its website or mobile application software. Suffice it to say that this social network can be analysed using mobile data provided by telecommunication firms
therefore there is little doubt that such a prohibition will have an impact on the profitability of Nigeria’s telecommunications business. As a result, this study will look into the impact of Twitter’s ban on Nigerian telecommunications businesses.
Statement of the Problem
On June 5, 2021, the Nigerian government issued an indefinite ban on Twitter, prohibiting it from operating in Nigeria, after the social media platform deleted tweets from Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari warning the south eastern people of Nigeria, primarily occupied by the Igbo people, of a potential repeat of the 1967 Biafran Civil War.
The Nigerian government claimed that the removal of the President’s tweets influenced their decision, but it was ultimately based on “a litany of problems with the social media platform in Nigeria, where misinformation and fake news spread through it have had real-world violent consequences”.
Although Amnesty International, British and Canadian missions, the Swedish Embassy in Nigeria, and domestic organisations such as the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) have all condemned the ban, its impact is expected to have a significant negative impact on the profitability of Nigerian telecommunications companies.
According to the Social-Media-Poll-Report (2020), over 120 million Nigerians have internet access, which is enabled by mobile data consumption, and approximately 40 million of them have a Twitter account, accounting for 20% of the population.
Thus, banning Twitter in Nigeria unavoidably means that telecommunications businesses would suffer significant losses not just in earnings but also in consumer engagement
which will most likely coincide with a fall in data usage, resulting in a difficult period for the business. As a result, this study will look into the impact of the Twitter ban on Nigerian telecommuting enterprises.
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