According to former presidential media aide, Doyin Okupe, ex-president Goodluck Jonathan, as a leader and a person, is perhaps the most abused in terms of hate speech in the history of this country.
Doyin Okupe said this when he spoke at the Vanguard Conference Hall which held recently. “I still say that Jonathan, as one person and as a leader of a country is perhaps, the most abused in terms of hate speech in the history of this country. Now, your question is extremely very pertinent. If somebody has gone through it and nothing happened, do we now have a justification to want to stop it? Yes, we do. I will support this administration with the idea that this type of thing should not be allowed to be visited. The current president is also taking a share of his own hate speech, but we must stop it somewhere. There is no need to allow this thing to fester on more than it has gone so far. I agree that there is a justification for the law and that we need to look into the situation properly and a proper law should be enacted that can control what we say and how we say them, especially on the social media. There is an absolute need for sanity because what goes on in the social media is pathetic, it is unthinkable. When I see a young man of 24 years old saying that Wole Soyinka is a fool, that may not exactly be hate speech, but it is intolerable. Today, I am not in government but there are people in government but being in government should not expose you to all sorts of assault simply because you are Minister of Information, President or Vice President. It should not make you be a target for unreasonable assault and attack. You cannot protect or defend yourself, and there are no sanctions for those who do those things. Therefore, for me, I will support this administration in this idea of trying to find a law to create sanity in the social media and also to prevent reckless statements that can incite or dehumanise people for no other reason except that they are in government offices” he said
