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The Federal Government, through its Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC), has criticized the owners of Facebook and Whatsapp, Meta Platforms, for claiming that the country is opposing their operations, cautioning the tech giant that its threat to withdraw from Nigeria does not absolve it of its legal duties or liabilities under Nigerian law.
This reaction followed Meta's assertion that it "may have to effectively shut down Facebook and Instagram services in Nigeria to mitigate the risk of enforcement actions."
Meta's warning surfaced after it failed in a legal attempt last week to overturn a ₦220 million fine imposed by the FCCPC for breaches of data protection and consumer rights regulations.
In response, the FCCPC issued a statement on Saturday, labeling Meta’s threat as "a calculated" strategy aimed at "eliciting negative public sentiment and possibly pressuring the FCCPC to rethink its ruling."
The FCCPC emphasized that Meta's threats to exit Nigeria do not free it from liabilities stemming from a judicial process. The Commission revealed that it identified numerous and repeated violations by Meta Parties of the FCCPA (2018) and the NDPR.
"These violations involved denying Nigerians the right to manage their personal data, transferring and sharing Nigerian user data without consent, treating Nigerian users less favorably than users in other regions, and misusing their dominant market position by imposing unfair privacy policies," the FCCPC stated.
"Interestingly, Meta has faced substantial fines for similar violations in Texas ($1.5 billion) and was recently ordered to pay $1.3 billion for breaking E.U. Data Privacy Regulations. In other countries like India, South Korea, France, and Australia, Meta has encountered various penalties for comparable infractions. However, Meta did not resort to blackmail by threatening to leave those nations; they complied."
