Digital rights: Senate seeks protection of minors as ASFF, others forge new consensus,
By Sola Ogundipe
The Senate Committee on ICT and Cybersecurity is committed to ensuring regulations to safeguard Nigerian minors from the growing threat of harmful online content and excessive technology use.
The Chairman of the Senate Committee on ICT and Cybersecurity, Senator Shuaib Afolabi Salisu, who disclosed this, said children now prefer isolation with their gadgets, a major departure from communal living, which harms their ability to connect with family and peers.
Salisu, who spoke in Lagos at a 2-day legislative retreat on Digital Rights and Digital Legislation under the theme “Strengthening Nigeria’s Digital Future through Rights-Based Legislation”, observed that the vast majority of Nigerians are not just minors, but also digital natives.
At the forum put together by Avocats Sans Frontieres France (ASF France) in collaboration with Paradigm Initiative (PIN), and the Centre for Information Technology and Development (CITAD), Salisu remarked, “They sometimes know how to use technology even more than their parents, and if you do not have a way of controlling their access and use of the technology, they are exposed to harmful content.
“Uncontrolled and excessive screen time is not just a moral issue but one that is actively ‘polluting minds’ and ‘distorting psyches’.
“We cannot allow the technology to go without being monitored, particularly for the minors, and therefore, we must put in place laws to protect them, and regulations that will ensure some level of control over services online.
“If they spend too much time on social media without any control, it also means that in other areas of their development, their education, their morals will also be impacted,” the Committee Chairman said.
Also speaking, the Chairman of the House Committee on ICT, House of Reps, Stanley Adedeji, said a Digital Rights Bill is intended to protect Nigerians without slowing down the country’s push toward a fully digital economy.
“We are at a point where technology is moving at the speed of light. The question is, as all this automation is happening, how do we protect the rights of our citizens? Sometimes things are legal but unethical, and sometimes things are unethical but illegal. Our job is to strike a balance,” Adedeji noted.
The Head of the Nigerian office of Avocats Sans Frontières France, Angela Uzoma-Iwuchukwu, said the event is to strengthen the digital rights laws in Nigeria to ensure that they are forward-looking and rights-respecting.
“The idea is to ensure that, as technology is evolving, we want to ensure that the human rights protection for Nigerians and all users of technology is also quickly evolving to cater for all the nuances and the new areas that are emerging in terms of the emerging technologies.
“We’re discussing the digital rights and freedom bill, which would now capture several elements of the Nigerian constitution.
“We’re going to be working on harmonising the AI bills that are before the National Assembly and also making our recommendations and inputs for the passage of this artificial intelligence bill so that even in terms of innovation on AI, Nigerians are rest assured that their lawmakers are abreast with issues and are ready to protect them,” Uzoma-Iwuchukwu asserted.
Jessica Odudu, spokesperson from the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, a funder of the engagement, emphasised the importance of this moment, stating: “Protecting digital rights is essential to enhancing democratic values and public trust. While there has been a lot of focus on the digital economy, the economy cannot thrive without respected rights. We are proud to support this process, which brings legislators and civil society together to build a rights-respecting digital future for Nigeria.”
Speaking ahead of the engagement, and referencing PIN’s long-standing dedication to this process, Khadijah El-Usman, Senior Officer, Programmes, Anglophone West Africa at Paradigm Initiative, noted, “ the return of the Digital Rights and Freedoms Bill reflects an urgent need for Nigeria to adopt a comprehensive framework that protects citizens online while enabling innovation. The space of digital rights and online protection is currently fragmented and vulnerable. As digital challenges grow more complex, this is the right moment for the National Assembly to re-evaluate the Bill and strengthen digital rights protections for all Nigerians.”
In the view of Gbenga Sesan, Executive Director of PIN, a persistent concern is balancing security with freedom of expression.
“Nigeria already has an imbalance. Security agencies have enormous influence over citizens’ rights. Phones are seized, and people are arrested arbitrarily. This must stop. Security can never happen without trust, trust cannot happen without justice, justice cannot happen without rights. Nigeria cannot build a $1 trillion digital economy without trust—and trust cannot exist without respect for citizens’ rights online.
On his part, the Executive Director of Media Rights Agenda, Edetaen Ojo, in his presentation of the draft legal rights and freedom bill 2024, said, “We already have quite several laws dealing with online issues, digital issues, and so on. But when you look at most of these laws, they are really criminal laws prohibiting different conduct and behaviors and creating punishments for them.
“We don’t really have any framework that protects rights online, so this bill is intended to protect human rights in the online environment in a manner that is consistent with the human rights provisions of the constitution as well as various regional and international instruments that Nigeria is a part of.”
The post Digital rights: Senate seeks protection of minors as ASFF, others forge new consensus appeared first on Vanguard News.
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The Senate Committee on ICT and Cybersecurity is committed to ensuring regulations to safeguard Nigerian minors from the growing threat of harmful online content and excessive technology use.
The post Digital rights: Senate seeks protection of minors as ASFF, others forge new consensus appeared first on Vanguard News.
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