‘Our accounts were hacked,’ Party shuts down Twitter, Facebook pages

monjola sotubo

May 18, 2015 3:07 PM

The PDP also denied recent messages which were sent out from the accounts including one which stated that the party was taking responsibility for the failures of the past 16 years.

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has closed its Twitter and Facebook accounts after alleging that they were hacked.

The clarification was made via a statement released on Monday, May 18, 2015, by National Publicity Secretary, Olisa Metuh.

“The national leadership of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) observed that in the course of the 2015 campaigns, personal positions and opinions of our party members were generally reported in many instances by the media as official positions of the PDP.”

“We have also noted that some of our new media handles, our Facebook and Twitter accounts, have been hacked, resulting in series of unauthorized releases, with the latest being Sunday’s post quoting our party as accepting responsibility for failure in the last 16 years; a statement which could not have come from the PDP that has a robust record of achievements in all sectors of our national life within the period.”

“However, now that the campaigns are over, we wish to notify the general public, especially the media, that henceforth only statements, utterances and positions of the national chairman and the national publicity secretary or any other national officer of the party authorized by the national working committee shall be regarded and reported as the official position of our great party in line with the relevant provisions of the PDP constitution.”

“Consequently, media houses, particularly the electronic media and the civil society, should note that only authorized persons should be invited to speak or stand in for the PDP for interviews, debates, talk shows or any other media appearance whatsoever.”

“Furthermore, to halt the embarrassing trend in our social media handles, the party has decided to decommission our official Twitter and Facebook accounts for now, to pave way for proper overhauling of the system.”

“Finally, we urge the media to always crosscheck with the relevant officials of our party on official matters before going to press‎.”

The official PDP Twitter handle had tweeted on Sunday, May 17, that the party accepts ‘responsibility for all that has gone wrong and bad in the last 16 years.’

monjola sotubo