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Fani-Kayode, Reno Omokri bicker over Zuckerberg’s Hausa comment

First Bank Nigeria

An off-the-cuff comment by Facebook founder, Mark Zuckerberg, about the importance of Hausa language, has pitted two prominent opposition figures on social media against each other.

Femi Fani-Kayode, a former Minister of Aviation and unabashed critic of the ruling APC, sparred with Reno Omokri, a former aide to President Goodluck Jonathan and social media strategist, in a series of harsh exchanges on Facebook Wednesday, with Mr. Fani-Kayode wishing he could have Mr. Omokri’s “little bottom spanked for being so cheeky and naughty.”

A Facebook user had on Tuesday afternoon drawn the attention of Mr. Zuckerberg, who is visiting Nigeria, to the Facebook Hausa language option and urged him to consider adding other major Nigerian languages —especially Yoruba, Igbo and Fulfulde— to the platform to reflect the country’s diversity.

“Thanks! I’m glad we support Hausa and we’re planning on supporting a lot more languages soon,” Mr. Zuckerberg responded.

Facebook introduced the Hausa language option about a month ago.

Mr. Fani-Kayode said the decision to add Hausa to Facebook was aimed at advancing a purported age-long agenda of Britain and America to prioritise the interests of the people of Northern Nigeria while suppressing the fortunes of the Southerners.

Mr. Fani-Kayode also highlighted a conspiracy in the timing.

“Kerry comes to the north and sees the Sultan of Sokoto, northern governors and Buhari. One week later, Facebook founder comes to Nigeria and says Hausa is a “unique language” which he has to be included on Facebook,” Mr. Fani-Kayode said. “Think Nigerians think.”

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