EndSARS: Former Presidential aspirant Garba sues Twitter founder for $1bn

Former Presidential aspirant, Adamu Garba, has sued Twitter and its founder, Jack Dorsey, for $1bn over the resultant violence that has marred the #EndSARS protests rocking the nation.

Dorsey had expressed his support for the #EndSARS protests across the nation.

Garba, who is a member of the ruling All Progressives Congress, filed a fundamental human rights suit before a Federal High Court in Abuja.

The motion on notice was brought pursuant to order II Rules 1, 2, 3 of the Fundamental Rights (Enforcement Procedure) Rules, 2009 and Sections 34(1), 35(1) and 41(1) and 43 of the 1999 Constitution.

Others joined in the suit include the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, the Attorney General of the Federation, the National Security Adviser, the Inspector General of Police, the Director-General of the Department of State Services, the Commandant of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps and the Nigeria Communications Commission.

Garba is seeking an “order directing the 8th (Dorsey) and 9th (Twitter) respondents jointly to pay him the sum of $1bn as damages.”

It remains to be seen how Garba will serve Twitter with the court processes since the social network giant has no office in Nigeria.

The former Presidential candidate had last week lambasted Dorsey for showing support to the protesters.

He tweeted, “Dear @jack. It’ll do you a lot more good if you stay away from Nigerian Politics. You should know that the so-called #EndSARS protest have transformed into political agitation, capable of breaking law & order in our country. You should not be a moral and financial sponsor to this.

“This is Nigeria; most of the demands initially presented were attended to by the responsible authorities. SARS no longer exists in this country. Your support for a disbanded entity was a needless interference. We cannot allow killings again in Nigeria in the name of protests.

“I understand that this may play well to your business, you have more content, more people and more activity on your platform, but to us is about life, peace and security of our dear country, we cannot allow you to be part of the people sponsoring disorder. We need peace and prosperity.

“I can see you are even sharing a link for people to donate money for this protest, an event capable of escalation beyond our already overstretched security management. If this protest continues to evolve into disorder (hopefully not) as a Nigerian citizen, we’ll meet in court.”