Desmond Elliot, a Nollywood actor who is representing Surulere constituency in the Lagos state house of assembly, says there’ll be no Nigeria in five years if the vices of social media aren’t tackled.
The film star had earlier denied claims by Harvey Olufumilayo, a Twitter influencer, that he pushed for a bill to regulate social media — sparking controversy on Twitter.
But on Thursday, a video of Elliot speaking at a recent plenary — where he addressed the vices of social media — surfaced and went viral on the microblogging platform.
In the video, the lawmaker reacted to the unrest that trailed the shooting of #EndSARS protesters at Lekki toll gate.
“We need to address certain things: Nigerian youth; social media; social influencers. These make the narrative that we’re seeing today. Except we’re joking with ourselves, social media has its negative impacts,” he can be heard saying.
“Let me first thank you for condemning the wanton killings and carnage that happened at Lekki. When I went through the comments, I could not believe it, Mr. Speaker. Curses, the abuses from children.
“And I asked myself, ‘Is this Nigeria? What is going on? Children cursing. People having the effrontery to enter an Oba’s palace and hold his staff of office? Culture is gone!
Govt declares curfew. Govt invites Army to kill people all night.
What does Desmond Elliot do?
HE BLAMES SOCIAL MEDIA.He calls us “children”
His anger is for attacking social media. NOT the killer govt slaughtering young people.Tomorrow he will deny this.
Pass this video on. pic.twitter.com/3bsRWJ2QHbAdvertisement— #OurFavOnlineDoc 🩺🇳🇬🇬🇧 (@DrOlufunmilayo) October 29, 2020
“Mr. Speaker, in the next five years, there will be no Nigeria if we don’t start now. The youth is not only those who do the peaceful protest. Those who have looted and destroyed lives, they are youths as well.
“Pregnant women went into malls, picked things, and went away. When shall we change this narrative? I put it to all the celebrities out there and all the motivational speakers. This is the only country we have.
“When anything happens, what is our common say is ‘we die here’. Please celebrities and social media influencers, stop the hatred already. You have a means constitutionally to change the government, it’s called your PVC.”
Elliot had a few weeks ago provoked outrage on social media after he defended and described his own political career as being a product of godfatherism.
Copyright 2024 TheCable. All rights reserved. This material, and other digital content on this website, may not be reproduced, published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed in whole or in part without prior express written permission from TheCable.
Follow us on twitter @Thecablestyle
What then is the status of section 39 and 40 of the 1999 constitution which spell out the integral ideals of freedom of expression.
We have Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that provides that “Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression, this right include freedom to hold opinion without interference, and to seek , receive and impact information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers”.
In addition, we have Article 9 of the African Charter On Human And Peoples Rights which provides that “Every individual shall have the right to express opinions with the law”
It will be recalled that Nigeria is a signatory to these two Articles.