Internet Censorship and Freedom of Expression in Nigeria

Internet regulation has become indispensable in today's globalized world; given the fact that online platforms have these last years, become serious tools for the perpetration of multiple forms of vices.Both democracies and autocratic countries have resorted to this paradigm to ensure a degree of sanity on their cyberspaces.This has often been to the dismay of many Net users, specifically the apologists of libertarianism and human right activists.Internet regulation has thus been problematic to many schools of thought; this because of the sometimes questionable approaches adopted by world governments to deal with cyber criminality in their countries.In tandem with this, it has often been argued that Internet censorship in most African countries has been more a threat to freedom on the Net in African countries, than a panacea to check online vices.Hinging on critical observations and secondary sources, this paper explores the extent to which this theory is true to the political situation in Nigeria.It provides the Nigerian perspective on internet censorship and specifically examines the ways in which government's draconian approaches to Internet regulation has affected digital rights and Internet freedoms in Nigeria.