Defence Minister claims he used FB page with less than 2,000 likes 'to reach a larger audience'

Defence Minister Adam Shareef Umar claims that the reason he opted to announce threats to national security via social media 'is to reach a larger audience as quickly as possible'.

Last Saturday, the minister took to his Facebook page to announce of possible threats to national security, adding that the military are on high alert and closely monitoring the situation.

However, this is yet to be announced officially by any of the relevant institutions.

While the minister faced immense criticism over the decision to announce such a critical subject via social media, he spoke on the matter at a ruling party rally in Ungoofaaru island of Raa atoll on Sunday.

He said that the reason he did so is 'to reach a wider audience because of the seriousness of the matter', adding that he felt like social media was the best platform to reach people of all colours.

The post was sent out from his Facebook page, which is unverified and had less than 2,000 likes and followers at the time. It is important to note that minister did the share these details throiugh his twitter account.

At the time of publishing, the minister's page had 1,979 likes and 2,003 followers. His post regarding the threats had received 38 comments, was shared 45 times and liked 91 times.

Because of this, it was hard for anyone to confirm whether the page actually belonged to Minister Shareef, especially with the military and police remaining mostly silent on the matter.

Opposition presidential candidate Ibrahim Mohamed Solih said that he saw the announcement as a joke and said that this was announced on social media 'is absurd' while other senior opposition officials describe it as an attempt to delay September's elections.