Court stops activist, orders Facebook to remove posts on Senator Natasha

Natasha

A Federal High Court in Abuja has stopped UK-based activist Dr. Sandra Duru (Prof Mgbeke) and Meta Platforms (Facebook’s operator) from sharing allegedly defamatory content about Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan. The court granted an interim injunction pending the suit’s determination, citing a “serious question to be tried” and potential “irreparable damage” to the senator’s reputation. The judge ordered Dr. Duru to refrain from posting defamatory content about Akpoti-Uduaghan on social media. The ruling was delivered by Justice I. Mohammed in Suit No: FCT/HC/CV/229/2025, was sequel to a motion on notice filed by the claimant, seeking urgent judicial protection against what she described as sustained online attacks on her reputation.

In a Certified True Copy of the ruling sighted by Sunday Vanguard, in Abuja, the court held that the application raised “a serious question to be tried” and that immediate intervention was required to prevent irreparable damage to the claimant’s reputation, pending the determination of the substantive suit.

Justice Mohammed consequently ordered that the first defendant, Sandra Duru, “either by herself, her agents, privies, or howsoever called, is restrained from further publishing, posting, sharing, disseminating or promoting on Facebook or any other social media platform any material containing defamatory, scandalous, inciteful or injurious content against the Applicant, pending the hearing and determination of the substantive suit.”

In a related development , the court also directed Meta Platforms Inc. to “immediately take down and/or disable access to all offending publications, posts or broadcasts made by the 1st Defendant against the Claimant, whether in her personal name or under the pseudonym ‘Prof Mgbeke,’ pending the determination of the suit.”

The court further ordered the social media company to preserve all electronic evidence relevant to the dispute, stating that the second defendant must “preserve, secure, and archive all content, metadata and digital footprints associated with the offending posts and user accounts operated by the 1st Defendant, for the purpose of aiding this Honourable Court in the fair determination of the substantive suit.”