By 
The Nigeria Police say it will arrest and prosecute perpetrators of hate speech and cyberbullying to signal that security forces will be monitoring activities of citizens on social media as political campaigns begin this month.
Violators could be charged under the Cybercrime (Prohibition, Prevention, etc) Act, Electoral Act, and Terrorism (Prevention) Act, police authority’ state even as hate speech and cyberbullying in relation to political views surge.
RELATED: Kaspersky reveals 48% of Nigerian parents name cyberbullying as main concern
By the timetable of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), political parties will be allowed to commence campaigns for the presidential and national assembly elections beginning September 28, 2022.
Campaigns for the governorship and state houses of assembly are to begin October 12, 2022 as Nigeria election year stretches to actual voting in first quarter of 2023.
The police say strong language, words or expressions tainted with religious, ethnic, tribal or sectional hate and used during live campaigns or as social media contents are prosecutable particularly under Section 92 of the Electoral Act, 2022.
Cyberbullying include: abusive texts, on-line posts and emails; imitating others on line using fake profile and other methods; spreading rumours and telling lies on-line; making hurtful comments; making threats or comments designed to intimidate on-line; repeated unwanted messages being sent to you; people using your account to send fake posts; people sending photos or videos of you to others to embarrass or humiliate you; and excluding others on-line.
What action can you take?
Block the person who is doing the bullying
Keep a record of threatening or intimidating messages
Contact police about any threatening or intimidating messages
Report the person to the social media platform
Don’t reply to bullies – that’s what they want
Check your privacy settings
Talk to someone you trust about the situation
What can police do?
If someone is threatening bullying or harassing you on-line, police want to know about it. You don’t have to put up with it and police can take action.
On-line bullies think they can be anonymous but police can track them down. That’s why it is important to inform police about what’s happening.
