The Nigerian economy lost an incredible N546.5 billion due to Twitter restriction that lasted for 222 days.

Remember that the Nigerian federal government on Wednesday lifted the suspension of Twitter operations in the nation.

According to the NetBlocks Cost of Shutdown Tool, Nigeria lost about N104.02 million ($250,600) every hour to the restriction, bringing the everyday losses to N2.46 billion.

The report also showed that at the end of Wednesday when the restriction was lifted, it was 5,328 hours in the 222 days because the social networking website was obstructed, and about N546.5 billion was currently lost by the economy.

Report has exposed that there were about 3.05 million Twitter users and potential audiences that the microblogging platform might reach with adverts on the platform.

2021 digital report, by a social networks and marketing control panel, Hootsuite, Twitter’s possible advertising audience compared to the overall population aged 13 plus in Nigeria is 2.4 per cent, while the quarter-on-quarter change in Twitter’s advertising reach is 17.3 per cent.

The ramification of this is that Twitter’s penetration in the nation is still very low compared to other platforms. Analytically, it equally implies that it is unlikely that these 3.05 million adverts audience would be affected by the American company.

While the ban lasted, some Nigerians, including federal government officials, were still tweeting. They prevented the procedure by installing Virtual Private Network (VPN).

VPN is a technology that secures your Internet traffic on unsecured networks to safeguard your online identity and hide your details.

The lifting of Twitter ban had been announced on Wednesday by the Chairman Technical Committee, Nigeria-Twitter Engagement and Director-General National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Kashifu Inuwa Abdullahi.

Kashifu, in a statement in Abuja, said the approval was provided following a memo written to the President by Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Isa Ali Ibrahim.

He stated: “The Federal Government of Nigeria (FGN) directs me to notify the public that President Muhammadu Buhari, GCFR, has authorized the lifting of the suspension of Twitter operation in Nigeria efficient from 12am tonight, 13th January 2022.

“The approval was offered following a memo composed to the President by the Honourable Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Prof Isa Ali Ibrahim.

“In the memo, the minister upgraded and requested the President’s approval for the lifting based upon the Technical Committee Nigeria-Twitter Engagement’s recommendation.”

Buhari’s government prohibited making use of microblogging site, Twitter in Nigeria on June 4, 2021, while the ban was raised after 222 days.

ToriNG