Oyo State Governor, Engr. Seyi Makinde has denied media reports which indicated that South West Governors had at a recent meeting held in Lagos voted in favour of a clampdown on social media.
He stated that the existing cyber-crime act should be able to deal
with issues that might arise from the use of cyberspace adding that
efforts must be made to rebuild the trust deficit that currently exists between the government and the citizens.
He further stated: “And I said in various fora that we are fully aware
of the trust-deficit in the system right now between the government,
leaders and the ordinary citizens. There is a lot of anger in the land. There is a lot of hunger as well. And we all have that responsibility to calm things down and to reduce that trust-deficit.”
He decried what he called the prevalence of fake news adding that those who want to play politics with other people’s emotions should note that “what usually goes around usually would come around.”
He explained that the State had signed an MOU with the University of Ibadan to enhance human rights administration in the state.
“Just yesterday, we signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the University of Ibadan to collaborate with the Oyo State government in the training of police officers and officers of other security agencies in criminal justice and human rights enforcement.
“This is with a view to eliminating incidents of police brutality, unlawful killings, extortion, and violation of human rights, amongst other vices. We have gone that step further because, again, we noticed that we do have a serious gap between the knowledge that the police have about their rights and how to treat ordinary people on the street. We need to be aware of how the system works. Change takes time,” he said.
While speaking earlier, the Attorney General of the state and
Commissioner for Justice, Prof Oyelowo Oyewo, assured that with the caliber of people on the panel, he was certain it would discharge the functions of making quality recommendations, meritoriously
Members of the panel chaired by former Chief of Judge of the State,
Justice Badejoko Adeniji include Mrs. O. O Ogundele (Secretary);
Prof. J. O Akintayo; Hon. Babatunde Oduyoye; Mrs. W. F Odutayo; N. O
Sulaiman; Ms. M. Y Kolawole; Mrs. M. Badmus; Ms. O Akintayo Falowo
Saheed; and Mrs. Agbeja Adebobola.
