A former Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, has once again dismissed allegations of a “massacre” at the Lekki Toll Gate during the 2020 EndSARS protests, maintaining that the claim was fuelled by fake news and unverified social media reports.
Speaking during an interview on ARISE News on Wednesday, the former minister reflected on his new book, Headlines and Soundbites: Media Moments That Defined an Administration, and addressed controversies from his time in office.
Mohammed noted that one of the biggest challenges he faced was countering misinformation, particularly during the EndSARS period.
“EndSARS was unfortunate, it was tragic, but the claim that there was a massacre at the tollgate is fake news,” he insisted.
“Nobody ever said nobody died during the EndSARS. People died even in Abuja. They died in Lagos. They died in Kano. But what we were saying is that CNN was not at the tollgate. CNN relied on second-hand thought and information,” he added.
The former minister said the Buhari administration believed unregulated social media had become a national threat and frequently fueled misinformation.
“One of the jobs of a communicator, one of the biggest challenges, is how do you prevent fake news and misinformation from overshadowing the real facts?” he asked.
Mohammed defended the 2021 suspension of Twitter, describing it as a difficult but necessary step to curb harmful content.
The Lekki Toll Gate incident occurred on October 20, 2020, during the nationwide EndSARS protests against police brutality in Nigeria.
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