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Tuesday 17 May 2016

Anti-social media Bill thrown out by Senate...

The Anti-social media Bill that was passed for first reading on Nov. 24, 2015 and passed for second reading on Dec. 2, 2015 was withdrawn by the Senate on Tuesday and also suspended further consideration on it. 

The decision to withdraw the Bill followed the report of the Committee on Judiciary, Human Rights and Legal Matters which recommended its withdrawal. 
Although In the report, the committee said that the bill was innovative, its passage in the form it was presented would hinder the anti-corruption war which was a focal point of the President Buhari led-administration. 
The committee Chairman, Sen. David Umaru, had said that most of the provisions of the Bill had already been covered by other extant laws of the Federation and could not be duplicated. 
According to Umaru, other findings by the committee which informed its recommendation were that the bill will make life difficult for Nigerians who lived far away from High Courts. 
He added that other forms of communication such as text messages, tweets, whatsapps which the Bill sought to police were already being regulated by the Nigerian Communication Act of 2003. 
He added that the purpose of the Bill was closely related to the offence of defamation which was also already covered by law.

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