Analysis of Selected Newspapers' Adherence to the Nigerian Media Code of Election Coverage Guidelines on Hate Speech in the 2019 Presidential Election

Abstract

This study analyses the extent of Nigerian newspapers' adherence to section four of The Nigerian Media Code of Election Coverage in the 2019 presidential election. The aim is to ascertain the extent to which hate speech manifested in the content of the selected newspapers, the dominant placement ofhate speech and the journalistic genre in which hate speech appeared in the 2019 presidential election campaigns. The study was anchored on Framing Theory and adopted Social Responsibility Theory as a supporting theory. Quantitative content analysis was used as the preferred research design. The instrument of data collection was the coding sheet. The content of three national dailies, Daily Sun, Daily Trust and The Nation, were analysed to assess how they adhered to guidelines on hate speech coverage during the period of the 2019 presidential election campaigns. The results obtained indicated that the extent to which newspapers refrained from publishing hate speech was low. The study also found that hate speech was located more in the inside pages of the newspapers than the front and back pages and that the journalistic genre in which hate speech appeared most was political news. The study concluded that the selected newspapers, Daily Sun, Daily Trust and The Nation, demonstrated low level of adherence to section 4 of The Nigerian Media Code of Election Coverage. It recommended among other things that alternative strategies of combating hate speech should be adopted and that media regulatory bodiesshould sanction newspapers that publish hate rhetoric in subsequent election.