Lai Mohammed recalls how fake news nearly ruined his 40-year-old marriage
The former minister renewed the call for the regulation of social media, arguing that the space remains a platform of choice for secessionists, terrorists, and bandits.
Nigeria's former Information Minister, Lai Mohammed
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Mohammed was in office between 2015 and 2023, and he spent much of his stint advocating for the regulation of social media due to the challenges the phenomenon posed to his work and society as a whole.
Meanwhile, the former minister has revealed that his job was not the only victim of malicious misinformation. As it turned out, Mohammed’s marital life was also impacted by the devious act.
He disclosed these while speaking at an event to commemorate the 90th birthday anniversary of Africa’s first Nobel Laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka, in Lagos.
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The ex-minister stressed that one of the pressing challenges he faced while in office was the hordes of fake news, misinformation, and disinformation.
On how the menace almost wrecked his marriage, Mohammed noted that the consequences of fake news, disinformation, and misinformation were far-reaching.
“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 sometime in 2018 when I came to Lagos from Abuja for an official assignment.
“As usual, I retire to bed about midnight, but at about 3 a.m., my wife gently roused me from my slumber.
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“At first, I panicked, fearing that there had been a security breach, but my wife’s mind belied that possibility, for she was calm and composed,” the ex-minister said.
Continuing, Mohamed said, “Solemnly, my wife asked me if I was fully awake as there were some serious issues to discuss.
“I could not fathom what was that urgent or serious to warrant being woken up at this time of the night.
“My mind immediately did a kaleidoscope of my rascalities and escapades in the last few months.”
According to the former minister, his wife narrated the "bombshell" accusation to him in the Yoruba language, but roughly translated thus:
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“Daddy, death can come knocking at any moment, please let me also, as your wife, be a signatory to your overseas account in Ali Financial which contains 1.3 billion dollars.”
He said he couldn't fathom that his wife, without any doubt, believed the fake story in circulation crediting humongous sums of money in overseas accounts to government officials under former President Muhammadu Buhari.
“I had to fetch a calculator and reproduce the Federal Appropriation Act for 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018 in the middle of the night and explain to her why it is simply preposterous for me to have 1.3 billion dollars in a foreign account.
“I explained to her that there is no year my capital budget exceeded N5 billion, which, at about N400 to a dollar, was just 12.5 million dollars.
“I explained that, even if I managed to divert every kobo of it to my personal account, it would take at least 104 years to save the sum of 1.3 billion dollars being peddled that I stole,” he recalled.
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Mohammed added: “My wife insisted that the whole world believed the story and that her friends had, as a result, besieged her with all kinds of requests.
“She said every effort on her part to deny the existence of this foreign account only succeeded in depicting her in the minds of her friends as a selfish, greedy, and uncaring friend.
“I spent the next two hours or so, sweating to convince my wife that there was no iota of truth in the allegation.
“Is my wife truly convinced of my innocence? The answer is in the wind!.”
He maintained that social media remained the platform of choice for the purveyors of fake news, anti-state groups, anarchists, secessionists, terrorists, and bandits.
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