Jonathan Nwokpor
Lai Mohammed, the immediate previous Minister of Information and Culture, highlighted how social media threatened his forty-year marriage.
Mohammed revealed this information in Lagos on an occasion to commemorate Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka’s 90th birthday.
He clarified that the proliferation of false information, misinformation, and fake news was one of the major issues he had to deal with while serving as a minister.
Speaking on how the threat nearly ended his marriage, Mohammed indicated that false information, misinformation, and fake news have far-reaching effects.
“Permit me to share publicly with you today for the first time, how social media threatened the foundation of my forty-year-old marriage.
“It was sometimes in 2018 when I came to Lagos from Abuja for an official assignment. As usual, I retire to bed about midnight, but about 3 am, my wife gently roused me from my slumber.
“At first, I panicked, fearing that there had been a security breach, but my wife’s mien belied that possibility, for she was calm and composed.
“Solemnly, my wife asked me if I was fully awake as there were some serious issues to discuss,” he said.
The former minister called his wife’s accusation a “bombshell.”
He expressed his disbelief that his spouse would fall for the hoax going around, which allegedly credited government employees and ministers during the administration of former President Muhammadu Buhari with enormous amounts of money in foreign accounts.
He states that those who spread false information, anti-state organisations, anarchists, secessionists, terrorists, and outlaws continue to favour social media.
He stated that his ministry discovered 476 websites devoted to disseminating false information against the previous government during his time in government.
According to the former minister, the spread of fake news has accelerated due to the use of deep learning and artificial intelligence techniques to produce highly lifelike recordings of sounds, photos, or videos that have been altered or fabricated.
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