Nigeria’s digital space is rapidly expanding, and so are the risks it poses. Platforms like WhatsApp, X, TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook have become central to political debate, journalism, activism, and business. In October 2025, DataReportal reported that Nigeria had nearly 47.8 million social media user identities. Nigerians increasingly turn to social media platforms for news, professional networking, and civic participation. Yet misinformation, AI-generated false content, online harassment, and growing government pressure to regulate online speech threaten public safety and democratic freedoms. Nigeria needs a rights-based approach to social media regulation that protects citizens without enabling censorship. A rights-based regulation should include clearer digital laws, stronger transparency and accountability requirements for technology platforms, and inclusive policymaking that involves civil society, journalists, and digital rights groups.
Beyond concerns about harmful content, digital regulation silences constructive criticism and restricts civic participation. Journalists, activists, and social media users often face arrest, intimidation, and surveillance over online expression, forcing them into fear and self-censorship. This repression weakens democratic accountability and discourages citizens from engaging in public debate. Nigeria risks normalizing digital repression, shrinking civic space, and eroding trust in democratic institutions. The long-term consequences of this repression would be a society where citizens cannot access information freely, challenge power, or engage meaningfully in governance.
There is a need for greater clarity in interpreting key provisions of the Cybercrimes Act. For example, Section 24 of the Act criminalizes the transmission of messages for purposes including causing “a breakdown of law and order.” However, the Act does not define what constitutes a “breakdown of law and order.” This absence of a clear definition leaves discretion to law enforcement authorities and courts in determining what conduct may threaten public order. It also enables targeting of journalists, activists, and government critics while creating uncertainty among social media users. An instance is the arrest and detention of investigative journalist Daniel Ojukwu in 2024 under the Cybercrimes Act, following his reporting on alleged financial misconduct by a public official. Clearer defined digital laws would help distinguish genuinely harmful conduct, such as inciting violence, threats to life, or coordinated disinformation campaigns, from legitimate expression and political criticism.
The European Union’s Digital Services Act, which places moderation obligations on platforms, is a model for Nigeria. The Act also emphasizes transparency, accountability, and user rights. Similarly, Kenya’s Court of Appeal has challenged overly broad cybercrime provisions that threaten free expression, including striking out criminal penalties for publishing “false information” online. These examples show that digital regulation can address online harms without undermining democratic freedoms.
To achieve clearer digital regulation, Nigeria should review its existing cybercrime and digital communication laws through an inclusive, multi-stakeholder process that involves lawmakers, civil society groups, media organizations, and technology experts. Narrowly tailored laws would reduce abuse, strengthen public trust, improve legal certainty, and better protect national security and fundamental rights online.
In Nigeria today, major platforms such as Meta, X, TikTok, and Google make critical content moderation and algorithmic decisions with limited public visibility. This lack of transparency makes it difficult to assess the amplification, removal, or restriction of content, and weakens users’ ability to challenge unfair decisions. Stronger transparency laws would require platforms to explain how their moderation systems work, how algorithms rank content, and how they detect and handle political or harmful content.
For instance, the European Union’s Digital Services Act requires large online platforms to publish regular transparency reports, disclose their advertising systems, and explain key algorithmic processes. These measures have improved oversight and given regulators and researchers better tools to assess platform behavior.
To strengthen digital platforms’ transparency in Nigeria, regulators like the Nigerian Data Protection Commission could mandate regular transparency reports, establish independent audits of platform systems, and require accessible appeal mechanisms for users who experience content removal or restriction. Regulators should also require platforms to invest in local-language moderation capacity and publish data on enforcement actions in Nigeria.
This approach would ensure stronger accountability, reduce arbitrary censorship and content moderation, improve user trust, and facilitate evidence-based policymaking in digital governance.
A rights-based approach to platform regulation in Nigeria requires more than clearer laws and transparent platform policies. There must also be inclusive and multi-stakeholder policymaking. In Nigeria, government ministries and security agencies often decide about online speech and platform governance with limited input from civil society, journalists, academics, women’s groups, and digital rights experts. This approach increases the risk of regulations that overlook real-world digital harms or unintentionally restrict legitimate expression.
Inclusive policymaking is important because digital regulation affects a wide range of actors beyond government and platforms. It determines how citizens have access to information, how journalists operate, and how businesses engage online. Excluding affected groups leads to ineffective policies, poor implementation, and public mistrust.
In developing its Marco Civil da Internet, Brazil conducted a public consultation process involving civil society organizations, academics, technology experts, businesses, and ordinary citizens, helping to produce a balanced and durable digital framework.
To implement inclusive policymaking in Nigeria, the government should institutionalize formal consultation mechanisms, establish multi-stakeholder advisory councils, and hold public hearings on major digital policy proposals. This process would improve policy legitimacy, reduce conflict between regulators and users, and strengthen public trust in digital governance.
Clearer laws, stronger platform transparency, and inclusive policymaking would protect freedom of expression and address online harms. These reforms will prevent future platform restrictions, arbitrary content moderation, and the decline of public confidence in democratic institutions. Nigeria must implement these reforms urgently to protect freedom of expression and the right to information.
Ayomide Eweje is a writing fellow at African Liberty.
TheCable is a co-publisher of this article.
Photo by Alexander Shatov on Unsplash.