The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), in a tweet on Thursday, June 1, stated that 150 million Nigerians have access to the Internet, while over 80 million have high-speed Internet access. But there are questions related to the fact that this access has been uninterrupted in recent years.
150 million Nigerians have access to the internet, while over 80 million have access to high speed internet💪🏾. #EVCNCC
— ncc.gov.ng (@NgComCommission) June 1, 2023
Surfshark, a cybersecurity company, conducted a study to understand the positions of UN countries on the 2021 UN Human Rights Council (HRC) Resolution on the promotion, protection and enjoyment of human rights on the Internet.
Comparing country positions with data from Surfshark's Internet Shutdown Tracker, Surfshark found that five African countries that said they supported the resolution "broke their word" by imposing Internet restrictions.
The Internet as a Human Right
In a document entitled “Ending Internet Shutdown: a path forward”, dated July 15, 2021, the United Nations (UN) states that “the right to access and use the Internet and other digital technologies for the purposes of peaceful assembly is protected by Article 20 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Article 21 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights”.
The resolution – led by a core group from Brazil, Nigeria, Sweden, Tunisia and the United States, and co-sponsored by 70 countries from all regions – was adopted by a vote with strong support in the Council on 13 July 2021. the fifth in a series of resolutions with the same title, the first of which was adopted in 2012.
Main points:
The resolution consolidates and reinforces the commitments undertaken to improve Internet accessibility and prices.
The resolution condemns Internet shutdowns and online censorship and calls on governments to end these measures. In this perspective, the High Commissioner for Human Rights was mandated to prepare a report on internet closures, analyzing their causes, legal implications and impacts on various human rights.
The resolution also underscores “the need to ensure that measures to protect national security, public order and public health, offline or online, are in full compliance with the obligations of international law and that the principles of legality are respected. , legitimacy, necessity and proportionality, and also underlines the need to protect human rights, including freedom of opinion and expression, peaceful assembly and association and privacy, and personal data in response to health and other emergencies”.
“In today's world, Internet shutdowns have become a major concern. Authoritarian governments often use them as a means to manipulate the public and stifle free speech.
The UN resolution on human rights on the Internet aims to get countries to openly condemn these closures and other forms of restricting online speech. However, it is worrying that, despite five African countries publicly supporting the resolution, they continue to impose Internet restrictions.
“It's important to promote an open and accessible Internet and press countries to respect their online human rights commitments,” says Gabriele Racaityte-Krasauske, spokesperson for Surfshark.
Sudan holds the second highest number of restrictions that occurred after the country supported the 2021 resolution. The first interruption came just three months after the resolution, coinciding with the outbreak of the military coup in Sudan.
NetBlocks network data confirmed a significant interruption of internet service in Sudan as of the morning of 25th October 2021, affecting cellular connectivity and some landline connectivity across multiple providers. The incident continued until 18 November 2021, when there was a significant re-establishment of service at several providers in Sudan after 24 days of downtime. Social media restrictions remained in effect until Wednesday, November 24, 2021.
Since then, Sudan has faced several large-scale internet outages, the most recent taking place in April 2023, in the midst of an ongoing armed conflict between rival factions of the military forces.
Burkina Faso has recorded four restrictions since the resolution was adopted in 2021. The restriction imposed by the country on Facebook in 2022 is still in effect.
The closure of Internet access through mobile phone networks in the country began just four months after the resolution. The government said in a statement that the shutdown is in the interests of national defense and public safety and will last until the evening of November 23, 2021.
The closure came in the wake of protests that blocked a French military supply convoy trying to travel from Ivory Coast to Niger. Protesters said they wanted to end French military intervention in the regional war against Islamist militants.
On January 23, 2022, Burkina Faso authorities shut down the internet for the third time in the space of months, targeting mobile internet in the country.
The closure was implemented amidst reports that mutinous soldiers had allegedly detained the country's President.
It was only on January 25, 2022 that the country had full reestablishment of access to the Internet and the unblocking of Facebook by the authorities of Burkina Faso.
Mauritania and Somalia have both experienced an Internet restriction since supporting the resolution. Mauritania restricted mobile internet due to a prison riot and Somalia suffered an internet blackout after parliament voted to remove the prime minister.
NetBlocks confirmed a nationwide outage of mobile internet traffic in Mauritania on March 6, 2023. This came after authorities launched a search for four high-risk prisoners, accused of terrorism and treason, who staged a riot and a prison break in Nouakchott. Service was re-established on March 12, 2023, after prisoners were detained or killed.
According to Surfshark, Nigeria had an ongoing restriction at the time of the resolution's adoption, but has had no new restrictions since then. Nigeria banned Twitter a month before the resolution was adopted, and the restriction lasted until January 2022.
Of the 193 member states of the UN, 14 countries have not kept their promises. Despite supporting the July 2021 UN Human Rights Council resolution, Surfshark's Internet Shutdown Tracker shows that these countries either had ongoing internet restrictions, or have stopped accessing the internet since then.
These countries are India, Sudan, Cuba, Uzbekistan, Burkina Faso, Pakistan, Russia, Brazil, Armenia, Indonesia, Mauritania, Nigeria, Somalia and Ukraine.
Why is this important?
78 countries (or 40%) supported the resolution, voted in favour.
More than half of the countries (111) adopted a passive position. They could not express their position through voting because they were not elected to the Council. However, they were given the opportunity to sponsor the resolution but chose not to.
On the other hand, four countries that were part of the Council decided to abstain from voting. These countries were Cameroon, China, Eritrea and Venezuela. Your decision not to vote on the resolution raises questions about your position on promoting human rights online.
According to a new report, a record number of countries cut access to internet services in response to political upheavals in 2022, causing "untold and persistent damage to people's lives".
“Governments use Internet shutdowns as weapons of control and shields from impunity,” said Felicia Anthonio of Access Now.
“In 2022, under authoritarian regimes and in democracies, power-mongers have accelerated their use of these callous tactics, disrupting the internet to fuel their oppressive agendas – manipulating narratives, silencing voices and providing coverage for their own acts of violence and abuse. .”
Research by internet rights group Access Now and the #KeepItOn coalition documents 187 shutdowns in 2022. These were introduced by governments in 35 countries – the highest number in a single year since the groups began documenting internet blackouts in 2016.
Most of the cuts were triggered by protests, conflicts and allegations of human rights violations, with a smaller number coinciding with school exams and elections.
In Africa, leaders are increasingly willing to turn off the Internet during major political events. Over the past two years, the governments of the Republic of Congo, Niger, Uganda and Zambia have cut off Internet access during elections.
The risk of internet shutdown is greatest in 2023, with presidential elections taking place in Gabon, Liberia, Libya, Madagascar, Sierra Leone, South Sudan, Sudan and Zimbabwe. The governments of all these countries, with the exception of Madagascar, have a history of shutting down the internet or restricting the use of digital platforms.
