faculty of art - university of nigeria

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OKORO NKECHINYERE CYNTHIA

PG/MA/14/67588

PRAGMATIC ANALYSIS OF SELECTED POLITICAL SPEECHES OF

PRESIDENT MUHAMMADU BUHARI

DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH AND LITERARY STUDIES

FACULTY OF ART

Godwin Valentine

Digitally Signed by: Content manager’s Name

DN : CN = Webmaster’s name

O= University of Nigeria, Nsukka

OU = Innovation Centre

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PRAGMATIC ANALYSIS OF SELECTED POLITICAL SPEECHES OF

PRESIDENT MUHAMMADU BUHARI

BY

OKORO NKECHINYERE CYNTHIA

PG/MA/14/67588

A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH AND LITERARY

STUDIES, UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA, NSUKKA, IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF

THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE AWARD OF MASTERS DEGREE IN ENGLISH

AS A SECOND LANGUAGE (ESL)

SUPERVISOR: BARR. (DR.) FLORENCE O. ORABUEZE

JANUARY, 2016

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Title Page

Pragmatic Analysis of Selected Political Speeches of President Muhammadu Buhari

By

Okoro Nkechinyere Cynthia

PG/MA/14/67588

A Thesis Submitted to the School of Postgraduate Studies, University Of Nigeria,

Nsukka, in Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Award of Masters Degree in

English as a Second Language (ESL)

Supervisor: Barr. (Dr.) Florence O. Orabueze

January 2016

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APPROVAL PAGE

This project has been approved by the Department of English and Literary Studies,

University of Nigeria, Nsukka.

By

___________________________________ __________________________

Dr. (Barr.) Florence O. Orabueze Date

(Supervisor)

____________________________________ ___________________________

Prof. Damain U. Opata Date

(Head of Department)

____________________________________ __________________________

External Examiner Date

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CERTIFICATION

This is to certify that Okoro Nkechinyere Cynthia with registration number

PG/M.A/14/67588, a postgraduate student in the Department of English and Literary Studies,

Faculty of Arts, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, has satisfactorily completed the requirements

for the award of Masters of Art (M.A) degree in English as a Second language. The work

embodied in this thesis is original and has not been submitted in part or full for any other

diploma or degree of this or any other University.

SUPERVISOR: Barr. Dr. (Mrs) Florence O. Orabueze

______________________________ ____________________________

Signature Date

HEAD OF DEPARTMENT: Prof. D.U Opata

______________________________ ____________________________

Signature Date

DEAN OF ARTS: Prof. P.U Okpoko

______________________________ ____________________________

Signature Date

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DEDICATION

This thesis is dedicated to God Almighty, the giver of wisdom and understanding and to the

memory of my late mother, Mrs Christy Okoro Obasi. Continue to rest in the bosom of the

Lord till we meet to part no more. Eternal rest grant unto her and let perpetual light shine

upon her, o Lord. Amen.

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The researcher acknowledges and appreciates God for His unfailing mercies and love

during the course of her study and this research and especially for the life He gave her. She

also in a special way appreciates the effort of her tireless and dynamic supervisor, Barr. Dr.

(Mrs) Florence O. Orabueze for her critique, and suggestions in the fulfilment of this study.

Words alone cannot quantify her gratitude. May God continue to bless and keep her and her

family. Amen.

She is equally indebted to the lecturers of the department for their insightful lectures

and knowledge they bestowed on her during the course of her programme. She owes special

thanks to her father, Mr. Okoro Uche Obasi for his financial and moral assistance during the

course of her study. May you reap the fruits of your labour. Amen. She is also grateful to Mr.

Jude Chibueze Odogwu for his love, understanding, financial and moral support given to her

during the duration of her study. May God continue to bless the labour of your hands. Amen.

Finally, she is grateful to her sister, Faustina Okoro and brother, Innocent Okoro who

always showed concern by asking about the progress of their sister’s research work and also

to her friends and course mates especially Omonona Folashade, Mbgeoji Bede and Ugwuoke

Samson for their time whenever she needs them and also to her roommates: Mrs. Osuorji

Anne, Ifeoma Chukwuorji, Ezenwanne Jane and Ewuru Chieloka for their accommodating

spirit and to all the 2014/2015 batch of coordinators of the Annunciation Catholic

Community (Nkrumah Basilica), an out-station of St Peter’s Chaplaincy, University of

Nigeria, Nsukka. It was a blessing working with you all. God bless us all. Amen.

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ABSTRACT

This study was undertaken to identify the pragmatic acts of locution, illocution and perlocution of President Muhammadu Buhari’s speeches during the campaign build-up of the March 2015 general elections. To do this, the study adopted the Speech Act Theory of Austin (1962) and Searle (1969) using the illocutionary acts of expressive, commissive, declarative, directive, assertive and verdictive. The data for the study were drawn from five purposively selected speeches of President Buhari: Formal Declaration of Interest for Presidency, My Manifesto and Vision for Nigeria, his speech at Chatham House, London, Acceptance Speech and Inaugural Speech. The quantitative research methodology was used, of which the descriptive survey method was employed for the analysis of data. These speeches were labelled A, B, C, D and E and ten sentences were extracted from each speech thereby generating a total number of fifty sentences from which one hundred speech acts (direct and indirect illocutionary acts) were obtained. The result of the analysis showed that the Overall Relative Frequency Percentages (ORFPs) of the selected speeches were: directive 28%, assertive 60%, expressive 16%, declarative 20%, commissive 42% and verdictive 34%. The result further revealed that these speeches were characterized by a preponderance of assertive and commissive acts which are mostly used as mobilization strategies especially in political campaigns by candidates to persuade their listeners in order to win elections. The study was concluded on the note that President Buhari should match his words with actions in order to fulfil all his campaign promises as Nigerians expect a complete turn around and positive change in all aspect of their nation’s life. The researcher recommended that future researches of President Buhari’s speeches should be done in the area of linguistic stylistic analysis, multimodal discourse analysis, Felicity Condition of Austin and Grice’s Cooperative Principle.

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Table of Contents

Title Page i

Approval Page ii

Certification iii

Dedication iv

Acknowledgments v

Abstract vi

Table of Contents vii

Chapter One: Introduction

1.1 Background to the Study 1

1.2 Statement of the Problem 4

1.3 Objectives of the Study 4

1.4 Significance of the Study 5

1.5 Scope of the Study 5

1.6 Research Questions 6

Chapter Two: Review of Related Literature

2.1 Review of Related Literature 7

2.2 Summary 17

Chapter Three: Theoretical Framework and Research Methodology

3.1 Theoretical Framework 18

3.2 Research Methodology 23

3.2.1 Research Design 23

3.2.2 Sample and Sampling Technique 24

3.2.3 Instruments for Data Collection 24

3.2.4 Method of Data Analysis 24

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3.3 Summary 25

Chapter Four: Analysis of Data and Discussion of Result

4.1 Analysis of Data of Selected Speeches 26

4.2 Discussion of Result 45

4.3 Summary 51

Chapter Five: Summary of Findings, Conclusion and Suggestions for Further Studies

5.1 Summary of Findings 52

5.2 Conclusion 53

5.3 Suggestions for Further Studies 53

Works Cited 54

Appendices

Data A: Formal Declaration of Interest for Presidency 58

Data B: My Manifesto and Vision for Nigeria 61

Data C: Speech at Chatham House, London 76

Data D: Acceptance Speech 83

Data E: Inaugural Speech 86

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CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background to the Study

Language is a unique attribute of humans, which is used as a chief medium of

communication, for building interpersonal relationships, exchange of ideas and passing of

information. Martinet A. defines it as “a formidable instrument of communication... by which

human experience is analysed...” (20). As a system of communication, it does not exist in a

vacuum, but operates in a context of situation. It is these contexts which determine the

variations in language that we call register. Language is very crucial for human survival and

existence, because it is the most important, and effective tool for communication. It is the

bond that holds societies and nations together. The primacy of language cuts across all facets

of human life: government, education, health, religion, politics, and so on. Gideon S.

Omachonu puts it as the “facilitator of human essence for all inventions and achievements

ever recorded in human existence have their roots in language as a veritable instrument of

thought and an indispensable channel of communication” (1).

Since this research work analyzes the pragmatics of selected political speeches of

President Muhammadu Buhari, it is important for us to understand the relationship that exists

between language and politics. In doing this therefore, we subscribe to the view made by

Anthony Paul Chilton when he states that politics is “the art of governance and power” while

language is “the universal capacity of humans in all societies to communicate” (20). Politics

is a struggle for power in order to put certain political, economic and social ideas into

practice (Faith Bayram 23). It is concerned with power to make decisions, control resources,

and control other people’s behaviour and, at times to control their values. In this process,

language plays a crucial role, for every political action is prepared, accompanied, influenced

and played by language. Language, therefore, plays an important role in politics because its

main function in different political situations is to enable politicians to form structurally

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stable social relationships. In other words, regimes, whether totalitarian or democratic have to

communicate so as to inform, persuade, advertise, issue rules and regulations, legislate, and

so on (Rozina Gunta and Indra Karapetjana 111). Although the use of language is

unquestionably important in politics, Norman Fairclough (1) observes that it can

“misrepresent as well as represent realities, it can weave visions and imaginations which can

be implemented to change realities and in some cases improve human well-being but it can

also rhetorically obfuscate realities and construe them ideologically to serve unjust power

relations”. In order words, language use in politics when put into action can yield democratic

dividends or achieve the reverse.

Language is the most vital tool in the hands of man; hence, it is essential in the

implementation of successful democratic rule in any country. Taiwo R. (92) observes that

language conveys power. It moves people to exercise their franchise, debate and even revolt.

It is therefore a central explanation of political stability or polarization.

The intrinsic link between language and politics has long been recognized, even in the

days of Aristotle, when he opines that “man is more of a political animal than bees or any

other gregarious animals... and man is the only animal which she has endowed with the gift

of speech” (Politics 1-II). Beard A. suggests that it is necessary to study the language of

politics because it enables us to “understand how language is used by those who wish to gain

power, those who wish to exercise power and those who wish to keep power” (2). He went

further to buttress his point by saying that “making speeches is a vital part of the politicians’

role in announcing policies and persuading people to agree with it” (35). Emmanuel

Sharndana C. and Judith A. Mgbemema are of the opinion that the language of politicians is

characterized by their ability to manipulate the linguistic resources in order to sell their

political ideologies and manifestoes to the electorates (20). Language is essential to

politicians and all their activities, ranging from campaign, manifestoes, rally, election,

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inauguration to governance are all carried out through the avenue created by language. This is

why J. Jones and J.S Peccei (30) states that politicians throughout the ages have achieved

success due to their “skilful use of rhetoric” by which they aim to persuade their audience of

the validity of their views through a delicate and careful use of elegant and persuasive

language.

The concept of political speech could be said to have originated from the rhetorical

works of Greek philosophers like the Sophists, Plato, Aristotle and Socrates. Rhetoric as the

springboard for political speeches is defined by the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary as

a “speech or writing that is intended to influence people” (A.S Hornby 1255). From the

foregoing, the primary purposes of political speeches are to influence, educate, inform,

persuade, incite or entertain people (Moses Omoniyi Ayeomoni and Susan Olajoke

Akinkuolere 461).

The office of the president is the highest political office in any country; therefore, it

needs to be in constant touch with the people and this can only be made possible through

speech making. The election of President Muhammadu Buhari made history in Nigeria as it

was the first time an incumbent and a member of the ruling party; the Peoples’ Democratic

Party (PDP) was voted out of office and the main opposition taking over the mantle of

leadership as the president and commander-in-chief in a democratic dispensation. It is

therefore of paramount importance that a democratically elected president or government

should place premium on the electorates as democracy is government of the people, by the

people and for the people. Speech-making, therefore, is the primary means of building,

establishing and strengthening these social relationships, expressing feelings and selling

policies, ideas and programmes in any society. From this point of view, it is quite agreeable

that politics has now become a linguistic affair while language has become a political issue

(Ayeomoni and Akinkuolere 462).

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Political discourse is any spoken or written text dealing with political issues (T.A Van

Dijk 3, quoted in Sharndama and Mgbemena 2). It involves a wide range of discourses,

genres, registers such as policy papers, ministerial speeches, government press releases and

electoral speeches and so on. Irrespective of the genre, it is written for or spoken by political

actors, that is, members of the government or the opposition, members of parliament, leaders

of political parties, candidates in office and so forth.

1.2 Statement of the Problem

The use of language in political speech making and the way in which it is used so as

to make the speech meaningful to the hearer is a very important enterprise that must be

ventured into, and this reason has prompted the researcher into undertaking a pragmatic

analysis of President Buhari’s political speeches. As far as the researcher is aware, nothing

has been done so far in the pragmatic analysis of Mr. President’s speeches, especially in this

present democratic dispensation. Scholars focus on researches on political speech-making

using different pragmatic principles. Eugenia Adaoma Igwedibia (2012) studied the

pragmatics of Barack Obama’s speeches using the Gricean theory of conversational maxims,

while Celina Ebere Krisagbedo (2010) explored the pragmatics of former President

Obasanjo’s speeches on corruption in Nigeria.

The lacuna which this research work recognizes, therefore, is that political speeches,

especially, that of President Buhari has not been studied and analysed pragmatically using the

Speech Acts Theory. It is therefore this gap in scholarship that this research work intends to

fill.

1.3 Objectives of the Study

This study investigates the pragmatics of selected political speeches of President

Muhammadu Buhari. It attempts therefore, to show how the language of the speech is

organized to communicate the political intentions of President Muhammadu Buhari. To

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realise the aims and objectives of this study, the following specific objectives were

formulated:

a. To identify the speech acts features of the selected political speeches, and

b. To determine how the identified features project the message of the president in

the speeches.

1.4 Significance of the Study

Politics has been a part of every society since the beginning of man’s civilization.

Political activities are masterminded by man; hence, man is the master of politics. It is an

important way of organizing and ordering so as to enhance these interactions, for the purpose

of achieving the desired results of society. The speeches of President Buhari had great impact

on his victory at the March, 2015 presidential polls. However, not many people understand

the underlying pragmatic import of these speeches. The main significance of this study,

therefore, is to throw more light on these speeches pragmatically so as to enable a better

understanding of the speaker’s point of view.

Also, this research will contribute meaningfully to scholarship because the results

from the analysis will be of immense help to politicians, political analysts, political speech

writers and even the common man (readers) who has some interest in political speeches.

Political analysts will benefit immensely from this work since it will further expose them to

the divergent ways of generating implied meanings in political speeches. It will also be of

immense value to political speech writers as they will get to know the intricacies of fusing

pragmatic principles in their speech writing to achieve the desired effects. Finally, it will give

an insight to readers of the language of politics and the kinds of speeches made in the

political process. It will also help researchers who intend to carry out an analysis of speeches

as a good reference guide during the course of their research.

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1.5 Scope of the Study

This study was limited to some political speeches of President Muhammadu Buhari.

The research work analyzes the pragmatics of selected political speeches of President Buhari,

starting from his formal declaration of interest for presidency held in October 2014 at the

Eagles’ Square, Abuja, to his inaugural speech on May 29th, 2015, at the same venue using

the Speech Act Theory as theoretical framework.

1.6 Research Questions

This research revolves around, and attempts to give answers to the following research

questions:

a. What are the Speech Act types that manifest in the selected political speeches?

b. To what extent are these identified speech acts significant for meaning in the selected

political speeches of President Buhari?

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CHAPTER TWO: REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

This chapter focuses on the review of existing literature in the interpretation of

discourses using pragmatic approach and other aspects related to the study and analysis of

political discourses. This review is not constrained by geography; attempts would therefore

be made to review the works of both foreign and Nigerian scholars who have contributed to

the development of pragmatics as a linguistic field in one way or the other through their

intellectual contributions in this discipline.

Undoubtedly is the fact that pragmatics which is a subset of discourse analysis has

received varying degree of attention in recent times as it is a new area of linguistics dwelling

on the “study of meaning in relation to situations” (Geoffrey N. Leech 6) and the

“relationship between linguistic forms and the user of those forms” (George Yule 4). Studies

on presidential speeches as an aspect of political discourse have been carried out by different

scholars as it is a domain of language use that has captured the hearts and interests of

researchers for a while now. This is because politics and political discourse is a complex

human activity that deserves critical and in-depth study and analysis because of its central

role in the organization and management of human societies. Nonetheless, scholars have also

dwelt on the pragmatics of literary texts, newspaper editorials and even the communicative

strategies employed by politicians through the perspective of Critical Discourse Analysis.

This review centres on the works of Shevelena Alla (53-62), Al-Faki Ibrahim Mohamed

(180-198), Akinwotu Samuel Alaba (43-51), Olaniyi Oladimeji and Bamigbola Esther (21-

32), Krisagbedo Celina Ebere (1-86), Olamide Ijadimine and Segun Aminu (1-8), Abaya

Samson Angulu (1-375), Sharndama and Mgbemena (19-37), Ikenna Kamalu and Richard

Agangan (31-53), Agbedo Chris Uchenna (146-165), Ademilokun Mohammed (1-12),

Ayeomoni and Akinkuolere (461-468), Onuigbo Sam (1-167), and Odebode Idowu and Eke-

Opara Cynthia (13-23).

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Shevelena Alla undertakes a study of the lingo-rhetorical and socio-pragmatic

peculiarities in political speeches of Barack Obama. The study consisted of two parts- the

description of the lingo-stylistic means used by the speaker, which were aimed at making

speech more emphatic, expressive, bright and intelligible while the second part contained a

brief commentary on the socio-pragmatic peculiarities typical of Barack Obama’s political

speeches. The data for the study were Obama’s inaugural address on January 20th, 2009, and

his speech titled “The Change We Need” delivered on September 17th, 2011. These speeches

were subjected to comparative and descriptive analysis, observation, comparison,

generalization, description and critical discourse analysis. The analysis of the linguistic and

stylistic means revealed that the orator used metaphors, reiteration and parallel structures

which produced a deep impression on the audience while the description of the socio-

pragmatic peculiarities of Mr. Barack Obama’s speech behaviour revealed his communicative

strategy in his use of political rhetoric. In this study, the pragmatic of Buhari’s political

speeches was not analysed thereby creating a gap in scholarship which this research intends

to fill.

Al-Faki Ibrahim Mohamed explores the political speeches of some African leaders

from a linguistic perspective. The aim of the study was to contribute to the field of critical

discourse analysis and the sub-field of political discourse analysis by examining and

analysing political speeches from a linguistic perspective. It also aimed to show how

linguistic tools can be manipulated to reveal speakers’ ideology and political stance. The

theoretical framework adopted for the study was M.A.K Halliday’s “Transitivity”, H.P

Grice’s Speech Act Theory as well as a semantic representation appearing in the political

analysed speeches. It adopted a qualitative method of data analysis to determine the presence

of the examined linguistic tools found in the political speeches of some African leaders while

the data for the study was derived and collected from secondary sources, concentrating

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heavily on printed materials, books, articles, magazines, the internet and periodicals. The

findings of the study revealed that the linguistic elements used by African leaders were

pronouns, metaphors, parallelism and analogy which were used to create oneness between

them and the audience. The study recommended that politicians should be plain in their use

of language so that a mutual understanding between them and their audience would be

established. This study dwells on the political speeches of African leaders from the viewpoint

of critical discourse analysis and this means invariably that the speeches of President Buhari

were not accounted for specifically from a pragmatic approach. It is this gap in scholarship

that necessitated the current study which seeks to shed light on the pragmatics of President

Buhari’s speeches.

Akinwotu Samuel Alaba explores a speech act analysis of the acceptance of

nomination speeches of Chief Obafemi Awolowo and Chief M.K.O Abiola using J.L

Austin’s (1962) Speech Act Theory as modified by Searle (1962 and 1979). The data for the

study were selected speeches of Chief Awolowo (presidential candidate of the Unity Party of

Nigeria- UPN- in 1979) and Chief Abiola (presidential candidate of the Social Democratic

Party- SDP- in 1993). Chief Awolowo speech “The Challenges of the new era” was delivered

at the UPN national convention in Lagos on the 6th of October, 1978 and was later published

in a collection of his speeches titled Path to Nigerian Greatness while that of Chief Abiola

“Hope for Nigerians” was delivered at the Social Democratic Party national convention in Jos

on the 29th of March 1993 and published later as Hope ’93: Farewell to Poverty. The

illocutionary acts of assertive, directive, commissive, expressive and declarative were

employed for the analysis of data. The findings of the study revealed that assertive acts

accounted for the largest proportion with 27.3% of the illocutionary acts, expressive and

commissive acts had 22.7% each while directive and declarative acts accounted for 18.2%

and 9.1% respectively. The preponderance of assertive, commissive and expressive acts was

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because of the nature of the data which were nomination speeches of party flag bearers and as

such, the speeches were full of illocutionary acts of thanking, assuring, encouraging,

informing and promising. The study was concluded on the note that unlike Presidential

Inaugural Speeches (PIA), acceptance (of nomination) speeches were mostly used as

mobilization strategies especially in political campaigns where it was necessary for

candidates to persuade their listeners towards a desired goal of winning elections. This study,

though shares the same theoretical framework as the present study, is quite different in that

the sources of data are not the same as data for this study were gotten from the political

speeches of President Buhari. It is this lacuna in knowledge that has prompted a research of

this nature.

Olaniyi Oladimeji and Bamigbola Esther investigate the contextual acts in President

Goodluck Jonathan’s declaration of presidential candidacy under the political platform of the

Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) using context and the Speech Act Theory. The aim of the

study was to examine how contextual illocutionary acts have been used to achieve a coherent

speech delivery. Data for analysis were gotten from his speech to declare his intention to run

as candidate under the platform of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP). The speech had

over thirty paragraphs and as such scanned through for discrete extractions of the ten

speeches which were then used for the analysis of data. The analysis and findings of this

study showed that the frequency scale of illocutionary acts revealed that most of the verbs

employed expressed actions performed in the form of commissive (50%), and assertive

(30%), declarative and expressive acts recorded ten percent (10%) each while the verdictives

recorded zero percent (0%). The result of the analysis implied that the President successfully

exploited the favourable contexts of his speech to persuade and make promises of good

governance. This study centred on the contextual act of President Jonathan and invariably

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nothing on President Buhari was accounted for pragmatically, hence, the justification of the

fact that there is need for this present study in other to fill this gap in scholarship.

Krisagbedo Celina Ebere examines a pragmatic analysis of former President

Obasanjo’s speeches on corruption in line with J.L Austin’s (1962) Speech Act Theory using

the felicity conditions of sincerity, preparation, execution and fulfilment. Former President

Obasanjo’s speeches were subjected to pragmatic analysis in order to ascertain the extent to

which his speeches about fighting corruption during his eight-year tenure conformed to or

violated the felicity conditions. The result of the analysis showed that his speeches, to a great

extent, violated the felicity conditions and were adjudged infelicitous. The study concluded

on the note that politicians should try to match their words with actions in order to alleviate

the national developmental challenges. This research focussed on the pragmatics of Chief

Obasanjo’s speeches on corruption using Austin’s felicity conditions without exploring that

of President Buhari. This gap in scholarship necessitated the current study which seeks to

dwell on the pragmatics of President Buhari’s speeches in line with the Speech Act Theory of

Austin (1962) and Searle (1969) using the illocutionary acts of assertive, directive,

declarative, commissive, expressive and verdictive.

Olamide Ijadimine and Segun Aminu explore a speech act analysis of editorial

comments of TELL Magazine. The study aimed at identifying the speech act features in the

selected editorials, analysing the identified features and relating them to meaning in the

context in which they were made. The data for the study comprised copies of TELL Magazine

which is a weekly publication by Nosa Igiebo. The selected copies spanned from January 6,

2014 to February 25, 2014 from which two sentences were selected from each edition thereby

making a total of sixteen sentences from eight editions which were used for the analysis. The

data were analysed using the modified version of Searle’s 1977 Speech Act Theory as used

by Mey (2006). From the analysis, it was revealed that representatives and expressive had the

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highest percentage with 40.6% each which invariably indicates the major function of news

magazine which is to inform the readers. 12.5% of the acts revealed the use of declarative in

other to strengthen decision and present verdict that have been made on certain issues and

subjects while commissive acts represented only 6.3% which implies that editors depend little

on commissive acts. The analysis also revealed that there was no significant use of directive

acts in that the job of the journalist is to beam light on the society unlike leaders that usually

lay claim to power by directing the people. This study is quite related to the present study

because of the use of the same theoretical framework but the present study concentrates on

political speeches as source of data and not a magazine. It is this gap in scholarship that

prompted a research of this nature.

Abaya Samson Angulu undertakes a pragmatics of Nigerian military coup

announcements adopting the linguistic theory of pragmatics as developed by Austin (1962)

and revised by Adegbija (1982 and 1999). The data for the study was subjected to an

analytical approach comprising of textual and opinion analysis. The opinion analysis

technique employed questionnaire, sampled opinions from newspapers and oral interview.

Sampled opinions from newspapers were collected from three national daily newspapers (two

government owned and one private) namely- Daily Times, New Nigeria and Nigerian

Tribune. Each of these papers were sampled for a period of one month after each coup event

and these newspapers represent two geographical zones of north and south of Nigeria. The

oral interview consisted of a set of guiding question which corresponds favourably with the

statement of the problem. The data for the study were seven different Nigerian military coup

speeches that were broadcast on National Radio and obtained from Kashim Ibrahim Library

of Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, which was the main source of data, the internet and

dubbed audio tapes of the seven coup broadcast were obtained from the Federal Radio

Corporation of Nigeria (FRCN) both at the Lagos and Kaduna stations. For the textual

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analysis, Adegbija’s pragma-sociolinguistics concept of the theory of pragmatics was applied.

The results and findings revealed that speech acts in each coup event depend largely on the

context that gave birth to them while the analysis at the social context level reveals that

speech relationship between interlocutors is both symmetric and asymmetric depending on

the audience. At the linguistic level, it was revealed that diction was used to enforce

illocutionary force. The study concludes that despite the peculiarities of military language, it

was still a subset of political language and therefore composed of direct and indirect

speeches. This present study is a shift from this as it focuses on the pragmatics of Buhari’s

speeches in a democratic dispensation thereby filling the gap in scholarship created by this

study.

Sharndama and Mgbemena examine the language of political discourse features of

two important political speeches made by two presidential aspirants in Nigeria- Dr. Goodluck

Ebele Jonathan of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) and General Muhammadu Buhari

(rtd) of the All Progressives Congress (APC). The study aimed at highlighting the strategies

employed by the speakers in order to communicate their ideologies and achieve effective

persuasion at lexical and syntactic levels. The study adopted Crystal’s and Davy’s (1985)

linguistic descriptive and discursive approach to language analysis. The results of their

analysis showed that the choice of linguistic resources contributed to the semantic and

persuasive import of the speeches and how speakers tend to achieve strategic and

communicative competence by the manipulative use of language resources. Although this

study focuses on the political discourse of Muhammadu Buhari, it failed to look at the

pragmatic import of his speeches, hence, the justification of the fact that there is need for the

present study since it intends to fill this gap in knowledge.

Kamalu Ikenna and Agangan Richard investigate the speech of President Goodluck’s

declaration of interest for his party’s presidential primaries. The study employed Critical

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Discourse Analysis as its theoretical framework and a qualitative approach in the analysis of

the text so as to “tease out the meaning potential of the rhetorical strategies deployed in the

speech and the ideology they encode” (31). Methods of and insights from Systemic

Functional Linguistics was employed to unearth the underlying ideology and persuasive

strategies used in the declaration speech. The data for the study consisted of a corpus of one

thousand eight hundred and fifty-five (1,855) words on a six page written text, being the text

of President Jonathan’s declaration of interest in the 2010 Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP)

presidential primaries. The data were written and delivered orally in English on 18th

September, 2010 and transmitted through the print and electronic media including the

internet. The data for the study was collected from President Jonathan’s facebook notes on

20th September, 2010. The study showed that the president employed conscious rhetorical

strategies to articulate an alternative ideology for the Nigeria nation. He wanted his audience

and his political antagonists to see and accept him as the metaphor of change they all long

for. He specifically employed the positive-face strategies to project his identity and self-

image and the negative-face strategies to coerce and threaten the opposition and to make

them jettison any sentiment of bias they may hold against his political ambition. Though this

study is similar with the present study in that they both deal with the analysis of political

speeches, the sources of data are quite different in that the present study focuses on the

speeches of President Buhari using the Speech Act Theory as theoretical framework and not

Discourse Analysis. It is this gap in scholarship that necessitated this present study.

Agbedo Chris Uchenna investigates the speech act of political discourse in the

Nigerian print media. He sought to analyse the speech acts of Bayo Onanuga and Yakubu

Mohammed of TheNEWS and Newswatch magazines during the reception of the 2005 winner

of Pulitzer Price for International Reporting in line with J.L Austin’s felicity conditions in

order to determine their status as felicitous or infelicitous and its implication for journalism as

25

a profession in Nigeria. The result of the analysis revealed that their speech acts were

adjudged to be infelicitous as they failed to meet the specifications of the felicity conditions

of sincerity, fulfilment, execution and preparation. Their infelicitous speech acts equally

failed to meet Grice’s cooperative principles and maxims of quality, quantity, relation and

manner. Thus giving rise to conversational implicature. This study dwells on the speech acts

of journalist unlike the present study which focuses on the political discourse of President

Buhari, thus filling this gap in scholarship.

Mohammed Ademilokun examines some political campaign adverts for the 2015

general elections in Nigeria with the objective of analysing patterns of verbal and non-verbal

meaning-making in the adverts. Data for the study comprised of corpus drawn from print

media advertisements in three national newspapers in Nigeria: The Punch, The Nation, and

Nigerian Tribune. The newspapers were published between January and March 2015, a

period that covers the peak of election campaigning for the build-up of the March 2015

general elections. For the analysis, nine advertisements were purposively selected and they

comprised adverts of the two major political parties, the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP)

and the All Progressives Congress (APC). The adverts contained campaigns for gubernatorial

and presidential elections. The study employed the social semiotic approach to multimodality

of Gunther Kress which has its root in the Systemic Functional Linguistics of M.A.K

Halliday. The findings of the study revealed that the adverts reflected the landscape before

and during the elections as the adverts were used by political parties and politicians to

fiercely pursue and promote their political agenda without recourse to modesty. The study

also revealed that the multimodal resources of the adverts which were mostly socio-culturally

grounded were analysed under the broad themes of appeal to history, emphasis on change and

appeal to credibility which were the major captions in the adverts. In this study, the 2015

general elections using a multimodal discourse analysis in analysing adverts of the elections

26

was the focus of the researcher and no attempt was made to analyse the pragmatics of

Buhari’s speeches. The present study therefore hopes to dwell on this aspect by filling the gap

created by this study.

Ayeomoni and Akinkuolere examine the pragmatics of victory and inaugural speeches

of President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua using the Speech Act Theory of Austin (1962) and

Searle (1969). The data for the study (victory and inaugural) were the first two speeches

delivered by the President in 2007 and they were downloaded from the internet. The selected

speeches were extracted from specific portions of the speeches, thus a total of ten sentences

comprising the first five and the last five were selected making a total of forty speech acts

(direct and indirect illocutionary acts). Efforts were also made to calculate the percentages of

the speech acts and which were later represented on tables. The findings show that the

Overall Relative Frequency Percentages (ORFPs) for the selected speeches were- assertive

(60%), directive (35%), expressive (15%), verdictive (40%), commissive (30%) and

declarative (20%). The result revealed that the President exploited fewer sentences which

were meant for indicating the sincerity of his intentions. The study concludes that the Speech

Act analysis of the political discourses of Umaru Musa Yar’Adua provided the understanding

that political leaders in Nigeria perform various acts through their speeches and that these

speech acts assist in the understanding and interpretation of the messages in their speeches.

Though this study has a major similarity with the present study in that they both employ the

same theoretical framework, it differs because the sources of data is quite different as the

present study focuses on the pragmatics of President Buhari’s speeches and not that of

Yar’Adua, thus filling this lacuna in scholarship.

Aside from researches done in analysing political speeches pragmatically, research

studies have also been carried out to investigate the pragmatics of literary works. In this

27

regard, Onuigbo Sam explores the theory of pragmatics in Ebele Ekos Bridges of Gold. He

adopted the Grice’s theory of conversational implicature for the analysis of this work.

Odebode Idowu and Eke-Opara Cynthia examine the ethnography of communication

in Ola Rotimi’s The Gods Are Not to Blame from a pragmatic viewpoint. The study

investigated eleven selected exchanges in the play and they were analysed using Dell Hymes

theory on utterance meaning (ethnography of communication), otherwise known as the

SPEAKING acronym where S means Setting, P means Participants, E means End, A means

Acts, K means Key, I means Instrument, N means Norm and G means Genre. The analysis of

the data showed that the play is a typical African traditional tragedy which relates to the issue

of royalty, frequency of the acts suggested that the text is not only dramatic but also

informative. The key suggested a melancholic mood thereby attesting to the thematic

preoccupation of the play which is tragedy. The study concluded on the note that the

ethnography of communication is a theory essential for successful demystification of

utterances, particularly in literary texts. The lacuna which this present study recognises is that

Odebode’s and Eke-Opara’s study analyses only literary text using a pragmatic approach

called the ethnography of communication without recourse to the political speeches of

President Buhari. It is this gap in scholarship that warranted this present study.

Significant as these contributions are to knowledge and scholarship, none has really

captured the pragmatics of President Buhari’s political speeches especially the speeches that

will be used for the analysis of this present study, using the Speech Act Theory of John

Langshaw Austin (1962) and John R. Searle (1969), hence, the justification of the fact that

there is a gap in scholarship which this research intends to fill by undertaking this study.

2.2 Summary

The literature review presented in this chapter is by no means exhaustive but suffice it

to say that it gives a useful insight into the purpose of this study which is pragmatically

28

oriented. It reviewed existing research works carried out using pragmatic approach, Critical

Discourse Analysis and Multimodal Discourse Analysis. Emphasis was also placed on

linguistic analysis through the analysis of lexical features and syntactic analysis of political

speeches in the review of literature.

29

CHAPTER THREE: THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK AND RESEARCH

METHODOLOGY

3.1 Theoretical Framework

The theoretical framework for any research serves as the tool for the analysis of

research data. For this study, the Speech Act Theory of Austin (1962) and Searle (1969)

served as the “spreadsheet for the analysis and evaluation of the selected speeches”

(Ayeomoni and Akinkuolere 463) of President Muhammadu Buhari. The choice of this

framework was borne out of the fact that people perform different actions through their words

and when utterances are made, a particular act is performed. This is what this theory intends

to explore in this study via the analysis of data.

The Speech Act Theory was initiated by the Austrian philosopher, Ludwig

Wittgenstein, but was actually given prominence by the British philosopher, John Langshaw

Austin, in his William James’ Lectures at Harvard in 1955. These lectures, twelve in all, were

posthumously published as How to Do Things with Words in 1962 shortly after his death in

1960. This could be considered as one of the central development of pragmatics, the other,

being the Theory of Conversational Implicature by Paul Grice (1962). His ideas, however,

were refined and systematized by his pupil, John R. Searle, the American philosopher.

Patrick Griffiths (148) defines speech acts as the “basic units of linguistic interaction....”

Also, Cutting Joan (13) states that speech acts are “the actions performed in saying

something”. For Wale Osisanwo (55), “an utterance is a speech act”. This is because in any

utterance a person makes, an act is performed. Acts performed include the following, but are

however not restricted to them: stating a fact, an opinion, confirming or denying something,

making a prediction or a request, issuing an order, asking a question and so on. It should be

noted that “speech acts are tied to sentences” (Jef Verschueren 131). This, therefore, means

30

that a ceremonial or political speech is not a speech act but a sequence or series of speech

acts.

According to Y. Huang (1000), the “central tenet of the speech act theory is that the

uttering of a sentence is part of an action....” The speech act theory aims to do justice to the

fact that people do more things with words than what their words ordinarily encode. Speech

acts which include making a promise are made up of verbs and these verbs play important

roles in speech acts. These verbs are divided into two: the performative verbs and the

constative verbs.

Performative verbs are used in performative utterances. Performatives, simply put,

means ‘saying means doing’. According to Chierchia Gennaro and Sally McConnell-Ginet

(174), a performative utterance “does not simply convey a message but performs some

substantive action”. That is to say that as one is uttering the sentence, the act is been

performed and carried out. An example of a performative is the utterance, “I declare the

convocation ceremony closed” (Osisanwo 56). The performative verb in the utterance above

is ‘declare’. Other performative verbs include abolish, order, swear, resign, demand, claim

and they spell out the illocutionary force behind the uttered sentences. It should however be

stated that performatives can be explicit or implicit.

Explicit performatives are performatives that have “a doing verb”. That is to say that

these performatives are obvious because of the presence of performative verbs like warn,

promise, baptise, admonish, convict, order, query, and prescribe, and so on, in utterances

where it occurs. An example of an explicit performative is the sentence, “I promise you five

hundred naira”. The explicitness of this performative can be seen in the presence of the

performative verb ‘promise’, which makes explicit the kind of act being performed. Implicit

performatives, on the other hand, contains no performative verb. An example of an implicit

performative is the utterance, “Smokers are liable to die young”. This sentence can either be a

31

warning or an advice, because its performativity is not made explicit in the utterance in which

it occurs.

Constatives are distinct from performatives in that they are “ordinary statements that

can be appraised as true or false in particular circumstances” (Gennaro and McConnell 176)

unlike performatives which are adjudged felicitous (happy) or infelicitous (unhappy). They

are used to state a fact or describe a state of affairs, and it contains no performative verb. An

example is the sentence, “He is a young man”.

Speech act types are also distinguished on the “basis of their structure and the

function the structure is performing” (Osisanwo 65). In this case, we have the direct and the

indirect speech act types. Basically, English sentences are grouped into three types, which are

the declaratives, interrogatives and the imperatives sentence types which are typically

associated with three basic illocutionary forces, namely, asserting/stating, asking/questioning

and ordering/requesting. Jerrold Sadock (1005) is of the opinion that “in the case of a direct

match between a sentence type and an illocutionary force, we have a direct speech act but if

there is no direct relationship between the sentence type and an illocutionary force then we

have an indirect speech act”. An example of an indirect speech act is when an interrogative is

used as a request in the sentence, “Can you pass me the salt?” While a declarative that is used

to make a statement is a direct speech act as in, “You are a cooking”. John I. Saeed (230)

describes the direct speech act as “the conventionally expected function” while the indirect

speech act he calls the “extra actual function”.

The most crucial part of the Speech Act Theory is a tripartite distinction of speech

acts into different kinds, which are the Locutionary act, the Illocutionary act and the

Perlocutionary act. The locutionary act is the act of saying something, illocutionary act is the

act performed in saying something, while the perlocutionary act is the act performed by

32

saying something, the effect the utterance has on the psychological state of the

hearer/addressee which could be inspiring, motivating, persuading, consoling, and so on.

Austin (92) is of the opinion that the locutionary act is composed of three important

components or acts which are the phonetic act, the phatic act and the rhetic act. The phonetic

acts are “acts of pronouncing sounds, phatic acts are acts of uttering words or sentences in

accordance with the phonological and syntactic rules of the language to which they belong

and the rhetic acts are acts of uttering a sentence with sense and ...reference” (Etsuko Oshi 3-

4). Therefore, the locutionary act is the “formal and literal meaning of an utterance”

(Osisanwo 58), which includes the phones, phemes and rhemes. Yule (48) sees it as the “first

basic act of utterance which involves producing a meaningful linguistic expression”.

Subscribing to Sadock’s opinion, locution is the “uttering of certain sounds, making of certain

marks and the construction of speech in conformity with the grammatical rules of a particular

language....” Ruth Kempson in her book, Presupposition and the Delimitation of Semantics

(51), puts the distinction among these three speech act types succinctly thus, “Speaker utters

sentences with a particular meaning (locutionary act) and with a particular force (illocutionary

act) in order to achieve a certain effect (perlocutionary act) on the hearer”. Also, Austin (10)

quoted in Sadock (55) distinguishes between these speech act kinds with his famous example,

“Shoot her”.

Locution: He said to me “Shoot her!” meaning by shoot “shoot” and referring by “her”

to her.

Illocution: He urged (or advised, ordered and so on) me to shoot her.

Perlocution: He persuaded me to shoot her.

Also, it should be stated that illocutionary act occupies a middle ground between

locutionary and perlocutionary acts. It is the proper domain of pragmatics (the study of

meaning in context) and the central focus of the speech act theory as it centres on the speaker

33

and what (s)he intends to achieve or fulfil in the course of producing an utterance. This view

is captured by Sandy Petrey when she notes that the speech act theory “shifts its focus from

what language is to what it does and sees a social process where other linguistic philosophies

see a formal structure” (3). Because of the importance of the illocutionary act to the Speech

Act Theory, it has now come to be used synonymously with this theory. Examples of

illocutionary act include threatening, warning, advising, claiming, blaming, accusing,

congratulating, promising, and thanking. These functions or actions are commonly referred to

as the illocutionary force of an utterance. S.A. Dada (149) posits that illocutionary acts are the

core of any theory of speech act as this deals with what is performed via the communicative

force of an utterance.... The importance of the illocutionary act to the speech act theory is

succinctly captured by Riemer in the following words, “the speaker ... does not simply say

something, instead (s)he does something (thank, congratulate or advise) by engaging in a

certain verbal behaviour” (109).

Attempts were also made in classifying and categorizing the illocutionary force of

utterances. In classifying and categorizing illocutionary force of utterances, numerous

scholars, notably Austin (1962), Searle (1969) and Keith Allan (1986) have all contributed

their quota to its classification. This study, however, concentrated on Austin’s and Searle’s

classificatory features since it is the focus of this study. Austin (152) classified speech acts

into five categories of:

Verditives: Typified by the giving of a verdict by a jury, arbitrator or umpire. It may also

include giving an estimate, assessing, reckoning or appraisal.

Exercitives: Typified by the exercising of powers, rights, or influence. They include

appointing, voting, and urging.

Commissives: It commits a speaker to a certain course of action. It is typified by promising.

34

Behavitives: Has to do with social behaviour and attitudes. They include congratulating and

challenging.

Expositives: Makes plain how our utterances fit into the course of an argument or

conversation. Examples are denying, affirming and stating.

Searle (1969), improving on Austin’s classification of illocutionary acts into

verditives, exercitives, commissives, behavitives and expositives, categorizes the illocutionary

act of utterances into five classes of expressive, declarative, assertive, directive and

commissive.

Expressive: This class of illocutionary act expresses a psychological state, which includes, but

not limited to thanking, apologizing, congratulating, welcoming and greeting.

Declarative: This class effects immediate changes in the institutional state of affairs and tends

to rely on elaborate extra-linguistic institutions such as excommunicating, marrying, firing

from employment, declaring a war and so on. Ayeomoni and Akinkuolere (463) posit that

“they are used to say something and make it so”. Other examples of declarative acts include

resigning, sentencing, dismissing and christening.

Assertive: This class of illocutionary act is also called representatives and it commits a

speaker to the truth of the same propositions. They are statements that describe a state of

affairs in the world, which could be true or false (Ayeomoni and Akinkuolere 463). They

include stating, claiming, reporting and announcing.

Directive: Directive acts are attempts by the speaker to get the addressee to do something;

they tend to bring an effect through the action of the hearer. They include ordering,

requesting, begging and questioning.

Commissive: This group of illocutions tend to commit the speaker to some future course of

action. Paradigm cases include promising, threatening, offering and swearing to do

something.

35

The illocutionary acts adopted for this study were Austin’s verdictive and Searle’s five

classificatory features.

3.2 Research Methodology

This section presents the procedures adopted for this study. It was structured and

organized under the following headings: research design, sample and sampling technique,

instruments for data collection and method of data analysis.

3.2.1 Research Design

The design of a study is the “blueprint which specifies how data... should be collected

and analysed” (Boniface G. Nworgu 67). For this study, the quantitative research

methodology was used, of which the descriptive survey method was employed for the

analysis of data. The choice of this methodology was borne out of the fact that it is interested

in describing and analysing certain variables of interest, which are related to the target

population, which in this case, is the selected speeches of President Muhammadu Buhari.

3.2.2 Sample and Sampling Technique

The sample for this study comprised of five political speeches made by President

Buhari. The speeches belong to the non-spontaneous category of oral speeches, that is to say,

that these speeches were formally prepared for oral delivery. The choice of selecting just five

speeches was necessitated by the fact that studying the entire population would not be

plausible in a study like this due to some logistic reasons, which includes time.

Judgmental/purposive sampling technique was used to arrive at the selection of these

five speeches. The choice of this sampling technique was due to the fact that it aids in the

selection of “those elements that satisfy certain requirements or criteria critical to the research

purpose” (Nworgu 108). As a result of the judgmental sampling technique, the following

political speeches of President Buhari were selected:

36

a. Formal Declaration of Interest for Presidency

b. My Manifesto and Vision for Nigeria

c. Speech at Chatham House, London

d. Acceptance Speech and

e. Inaugural Speech

3.2.3 Instruments for Data Collection

The selected speeches were downloaded from the internet from different national

dailies which includes the Vanguard, the Daily-Post, Igbo Focus, Abusidiqu.com and

Channels Television (online platform). The researcher also consulted the library for materials

on Speech Act Theory in order to carry out a detailed analysis of the selected speeches, using

this theory.

3.2.4 Method of Data Analysis

This involves the analysis of President Buhari’s five selected political speeches, using

the Speech Act Theory of Austin (1962) and Searle (1969) in order to show how the

president, through his speeches, was able to encode his intended meaning to the

masses/electorates through the illocutionary acts of verdictive, expressive, commissive,

directive, assertive and declarative and also to see the expected perlocutionary effects these

speeches tend to have on the electorates. Each locutionary act was however divided into direct

and indirect illocutionary acts from which we had the illocutionary act of expressive,

verdictive, commissive, directive, declarative and assertive.

In order to carry out an explicit and insightful analysis, the five selected speeches were

labelled A, B, C, D and E and from each speech, ten sentences were extracted, making a total

number of fifty sentences, which was used for the analysis of data. Also, each sentence was

labelled A1-10, B1-10, C1-10, D1-10, and E1-10 to aid simplicity of the analysis and for easy

understanding. The percentages of the illocutionary act types of these speeches were also

37

calculated after generating their frequencies on tables. The percentages generated were

reflected on a bar chart which formed the basis for the analysis and discussion of result. This

formula was thus generated to perform this arithmetic operation:

Total number of speech acts × 100

Total number of sentences used for analysis 1

3.3 Summary

This chapter focused on the theoretical and methodological approaches taken for an

in-depth analysis of data gotten from the political speeches of President Muhammadu Buhari.

It began by looking at the theoretical underpinnings of this discourse, which is the Speech Act

Theory of Austin (1962) and Searle (1969). Thereafter, it looked at the research methodology

which encompassed the research design, sample and sampling technique, instruments for data

collection and the method adopted for data analysis.

38

CHAPTER FOUR: ANALYSIS OF DATA AND DISCUSSION OF RESULT

4.1 Data Analysis of Selected Speeches

Here, the researcher undertakes an in-depth analysis of the data gathered for the

analysis of these five speeches in order to identify the speech acts in these selected speeches.

She grouped these data using the English alphabet system of A, B, C, D and E to aid

simplicity of the analysis.

Data A: Formal Declaration of Interest for Presidency

A1

Locution (The act of saying something):

I would like, Mr Chairman, if I may, pay tribute to Nigerians as a whole who are enduring all

sorts of hardships and deprivations on a daily basis.

Illocution (The act performed in saying something):

i. Direct- assertive (stating)

ii. Indirect- verdictive (assessing)

Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Sobriety

A2


It is everyone’s duty to resolve and help the national effort to overcome these immense

challenges.


i. Direct- directive (inviting)

ii. Indirect- assertive (stating)

Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Encouraging

A3


39

I humbly wish to present myself before you, before all of Nigeria and before God seeking to

be elected as APC’s presidential candidate.


i. Direct- declarative (confirming)


Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Cheerfulness

A4


Nigeria in my experience has never been so divided, so polarized.



ii. Indirect- expressive (complaint)

Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Worry

A5


We in APC are resolved to bring change to Nigeria.


i. Direct- commissive (guaranteeing)


Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Hopefulness

A6


We plan to do things differently.



40

ii. Indirect- commissive (assuring)


A7


We plan to put priority on protection of lives and property.


i. Direct- assertive ( stating)

ii. Indirect- commissive (promising)

Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): hopefulness

A8


We plan to put priority on reviving industry to generate employment.





A9


We plan to put priority on tackling corruption which has become blatant and widespread.





A10


41

We plan to put priority on respecting the constitutional separation of powers.


i. Direct- assertive (saying)



Table 1

Formal Declaration of Interest for Presidency

SPEECH ACTS (DIRECT

AND INDIRECT)

FREQUENCY PERCENTAGE

Expressive 1 10%

Assertive 9 90%

Declarative 1 10%

Directive 1 10%

Verdictive 2 20%

Commissive 6 60%

Total number of speech acts= 20

Data B: My Manifesto and Vision for Nigeria

B1


For the little and common men and women who helped build this nation, things have never

been so bad for these fellows.



42


Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): reflective

B2


What is certain in Nigeria is that the entire country is in need of being fixed.




Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): reflective

B3


I, Muhammadu Buhari have now come for the rescue.





B4


This is success by design.


i. Direct- expressive (savouring the situation)



43

B5


I, Muhammadu Buhari, have resolved that the task ahead of me is that of securing our nation

and prospering our people.





B6


Each one of you and I must work together to get our economy on the right track, mend our

broken lives, infrastructure, institutions and the overall society.


i. Direct- directive (requesting)


Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Encouraging and inviting

B7


You must help me to reform our rotten political system, by getting involved, taking

responsibility and working together as a team.


i. Direct- directive (appealing)

ii. Indirect- verdictive (instructing)

Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Inviting

44

B8


Make me your presidential candidate in both the primaries and the presidential elections.



ii. Indirect-assertive (stating)

Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Persuading

B9


I will bring permanent peace and solution to the insurgency issues in the North-East, the

Niger-Delta and other conflict prone states.


i. Direct- commissive (promising)

ii. Indirect- declarative (confirming)


B10


I will guarantee that women are adequately represented in government appointments.


i. Direct- commissive (promising)



45

Table 2

My Manifesto and Vision for Nigeria

SPEECH ACTS

(DIRECT AND

INDIRECT)


Expressive 1 10%

Assertive 5 50%

Declarative 4 40%

Directive 3 30%

Verdictive 4 40%

Commissive 3 30%


Data C: Speech at Chatham House, London

C1


Permit me to start by thanking Chatham House for the invitation to talk about this important

topic at this crucial time.



ii. Indirect- expressive (appreciating)

Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Applause

46

C2


Let me assure you that if I am elected president, the world will have no reason to worry about

Nigeria.


i. Direct- commissive (assuring)



C3


We will always act on time and not allow problems to irresponsibly fester.





C4


I, Muhammadu Buhari, will always lead from the front and return Nigeria to its leadership

role in regional and international efforts to combat terrorism.


i. Direct- commissive (vowing)



47

C5


Corruption will have no place and the corrupt will not be appointed into my administration.





C6


But I must emphasize that any war waged on corruption should not be misconstrued as

settling old scores or a witch-hunt.




Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Convincing

C7


I’m running for president to lead Nigeria to prosperity and not adversity.




Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Optimistic

48

C8


I have heard and read references to me as a former dictator in many respected British

newspapers, including the well regarded Economist.




Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Reflective

C9


I cannot change the past but I can change the present and the future.





C10


Before you is a former military ruler and a converted democrat who is ready to operate under

democratic norms and is subjecting himself to the rigours of democratic elections for the

fourth time.



ii. Indirect- directive (appealing)


49

Table 3

Speech at Chatham House, London.

SPEECH ACTS

(DIRECT AND

INDIRECT)


Expressive 1 10%

Assertive 6 60%

Declarative 2 20%

Directive 3 30%

Verdictive 3 30%

Commissive 5 50%


Data D: Acceptance Speech

D1


I want all Nigerians to join me in congratulating and appreciating Mr. President for his

statesmanship.





D2


50

You stood in line patiently for hours; in the rain, in the sun and then in the dark to cast your

votes.


i. Direct- Verdictive (assessing)

ii. Indirect- Declarative (confirming)

Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Reflective

D3


You did so peacefully.




Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Excitement

D4


Your vote affirms that you believe Nigeria’s future can be better than what it is today.


i. Direct- verdictive (assessing)



D5


You voted for change and now change has come.

51





D6


It is you, Nigerians that have won.





D7


This is indeed historic.





D8


I ask that all be circumspect, respectful and peaceful in these times.




Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Urging

52

D9


This is not the time for confrontation.




Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Appeasement

D10


This is a moment that we must begin to heal the wounds and work toward a better future.




Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Reconciliatory

Table 4

Acceptance Speech

SPEECH ACTS (DIRECT AND

INDIRECT)


Expressive 3 30%

Assertive 5 50%

Declarative 1 10%

Directive 4 40%

Verdictive 6 60%

Commissive 1 10%


53

Data E: Inaugural Speech

E1


Today marks a triumph for Nigeria and an occasion to celebrate her freedom.





E2


Our journey has not been easy but thanks to the determination of our people.



ii. Indirect- expressive (happy about the outcome)


E3


I would like to thank President Goodluck Jonathan for his display of statesmanship in setting

a precedent for us that has now made our people proud to be Nigerians wherever they are.


i. Direct- commissive (appreciating)


Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Applause

E4


54

I would like to thank the millions of our supporters who believed in us even when the cause

seemed hopeless.


i. Direct- expressive (appreciating)



E5


I intend to keep my oath and serve as President to all Nigerians.


i. Direct- commissive (assuring)

ii. Indirect- directive (appealing)


E6


I belong to everybody and I belong to nobody.


i. Direct- directive (warning)



E7


There will be no paying off old scores.



55



E8


The past is prologue.





E9


Nigeria under our administration will be ready to play any leadership role that Africa expects

of it.





E10


We have an opportunity, let us take it.




Perlocution (The act performed by saying something): Motivating and inviting

56

Table 5

Inaugural Speech

SPEECH ACTS

(DIRECT AND

INDIRECT)


Expressive 2 20%

Assertive 5 50%

Declarative 2 20%

Directive 3 30%

Verdictive 2 20%

Commissive 6 60%


57

Graphical Representations of Analysed Data

Fig. 1. Formal Declaration of Interest for Presidency.

Fig. 2. My Manifesto and Vision for Nigeria.

10%

50%

30%

40%

40%

30%

Expressive

Assertive

Commissive

Declarative Verdictive

Directive

10%

90%

10% 10%20%

60%Expressive

Assertive

Declarative

Directive Verdictive

Commissive

58

Fig. 3. Speech at Chatham House, London.

Fig. 4. Acceptance Speech.

10%

60%

20%30% 30%

50%Declarative

Verdictive Directive

Commissive

Assertive

Expressive

30%

50%

10%

40%

60%

10%

Expressive

Assertive

Declarative

Directive

Verdictive

Commissive

59

Fig. 5. Inaugural Speech.

Table 6

Summary of Tables A-E (Overall Relative Frequency Percentages)

Speech Act (Direct and

Indirect)

Frequency Percentage

Assertive 30 60%

Directive 14 28%

Expressive 8 16%

Verdictive 17 34%

Commissive 21 42%

Declarative 10 20%


20%

50%

20%

30%

20%

60%Expressive

Assertive

Declarative

Directive

Verdictive

Commissive

60

Fig. 6. Graphical Representation of Overall Relative Frequency Percentages (ORFPs)

4.2 Discussion of Result

This section of the study captures the discussion and interpretation of results gotten

from the analyzed data. It also gives answers to the two research questions generated for this

study. Language is a powerful tool in the hands of politicians and almost all their activities

and achievements depend on how well they utilize this powerful resource at their disposal.

Also, we get to know their thoughts and intentions by going through their words and

speeches. The discussion of findings in this section concentrated on the percentages of speech

acts of Austin (1962) and Searle (1969) gotten from the analysis of data. The speeches were

labelled A, B, C, D and E and discussed in the order of hierarchy as was presented in this

study. It is worthy to note that the speech acts analysed performed both direct and indirect

illocutionary acts.


It is interesting to note that Mr President’s speeches at his formal declaration of

interest from the analysis revealed that he used mainly assertive (90%) and commissive

(60%) as they had the highest percentage while verdictive (20%), directive (10%) and

declarative (10%) recorded the lowest percentage. In effect, the president used more of

60%

28%

16%

34%42%

20%

Assertive

Directive

Expressive

Verdictive

Commissive

Declarative

61

assertive and commissive to inform, state, affirm, promise and assure his supporters and party

faithful of his agenda for change and his intention to run for presidency. This is why he

affirms and assures Nigerians that: “We plan to do things differently”. Also, expressive,

declarative and verdictive were used for assessing, inviting and confirming.


The analysis of this speech revealed that President Muhammadu Buhari used more of

assertive (50%), declarative (40%) and verdictive (40%). These illocutionary acts were used

for stating, confirming and assessing the state of affairs of the nation and the need of it to get

“fixed”. He also made use of directive (30%) to instruct, solicit, invite and request for a

reunion and recommitment to revamping and rebuilding the nation. Commissive acts (30%)

were used for promising and assuring Nigerians of his aims of “bringing peace and solution

to the insurgency issues” and also for guaranteeing gender equality in government

appointments in which women will occupy political offices. Expressive had the lowest

percentage (10%) as he hardly employed this act in his speech.


The bar chart of this speech revealed that the illocutionary acts dominant were the

assertive and commissive speech acts with each having 60% and 50% respectively. This

suggested that President Muhammadu Buhari used assertive to state and affirm as in this

sentence: “I, Muhammadu Buhari will always lead from the front....” while commissives

were used in promising, vowing, assuring and guaranteeing. An example was found in the

sentence where he assured Nigerians and the international community of his readiness to

serve: “I cannot change the past but I can change the present and future”. Directive,

declarative, verdictive and expressive had 30%, 20%, 30% and 10% respectively. Directives

were used to appeal to Nigerians, of his decision to serve as a civilian president and not as a

military ruler (dictator) but as a democrat “who is subjecting himself to the rigours of

62

democratic election for the fourth time”. Declaratives were used to confirm his earlier stance

on changing the state of affairs of the nation which includes the problem of corruption as he

repeatedly pointed out: “Corruption will have no place and the corrupt will not be appointed

into my administration”. Verdictives were used for assessing while the expressive in this

speech was used to appreciate Chatham House for the invitation he was given.


The analysis of this speech revealed that the President made use of mainly verdictives

(60%), assertive (50%), directives (40%) and expressive (30%). Upon the announcement of

him as the winner of the March 28 general elections, it was necessary for him to use these

speech acts. Verdictives were used to assess and instruct the masses and the opposition to

calm their nerves as “this is not the time for confrontation” but a moment to “heal wounds

and work towards a better future”. He was indirectly suing for peace as many were aggrieved

with the outcome and results of the election. He used assertive to state and affirm while

directives were used to request and appeal for peace and calmness in the nation: “I ask that

we all be circumspect, respectful and peaceful in these times”. Expressive were used to

appreciate and thank the masses for their support in his victory at the polls and for also

appreciating President Goodluck Jonathan “for his statesmanship” and for his acceptance of

defeat even before the results were announced officially.


The analysis of this speech revealed that President Buhari used mainly sentences that

were commissive as they had a total of 60%. It is usual for a newly sworn-in government and

administration to make promises and vows, and assuring the masses of his readiness to keep

its campaign promises: “I intend to keep my oath and serve as president to all Nigerians”. He

also used it to appreciate the masses for their “believe in us even when the cause seemed

hopeless”. Assertives were used to affirm, state and riterate, while directives were used to

63

appeal, instruct, request and warn as in: “I belong to everybody and I belong to nobody”. This

sentence appealed to the masses as it was greeted with cheerfulness. It was a warning and an

appeal to all, especially the political class that there will be no more allegiance to godfathers,

and partisan politics as he belongs to everybody and to no one in particular. Another directive

was the request: “We have an opportunity, let us take it”. He was appealing and requesting

Nigerians to make use of this opportunity, opportunity for change and to change the state of

affairs of this nation by being actively involved in the collaborative growth of the nation.

Discussion of Research Question A: What are the speech act types that manifest in the

selected speeches?

Our findings from the analysis of the five selected speeches revealed that President

Muhammadu Buhari employed the illocutionary force of thanking, declaring, advising,

inviting, appealing, promising, asserting, congratulating, and personal commitment, what

Searle calls commissives. These were evident in his use of illocutionary acts that were

assertive, declarative, directive, expressive, verdictive and commissive.

The analysis also reveals that the Overall Relative Frequency Percentages (ORFPs) of

the speech acts in these speeches were: assertive having sixty percent (60%) of the overall

speech acts, commissive with forty-two percent (42%), verdictive with thirty-four percent

(34%), directive with twenty-eight percent (28%), declarative with twenty percent (20%), and

expressive with sixteen percent (16%).

Discussion of Research Question B: To what extent are these identified speech acts

significant for meaning in the selected political speeches of President Buhari?

The essence of any communication is to convey meaning and information as there is

no communication act without an encoded meaning. It is this (the encoded meaning), which

is the central focus of the Speech Act Theory which concerns itself with “how to do things

with words”. As have been earlier noted in Chapter Three of this study, speech acts is

64

synonymous with the illocutionary act. This is because the illocutionary force of an utterance

contributes to the overall meaning of that utterance.

Our findings from the analysis of data revealed that the identified speech acts of

verdictive, assertive, commissive, expressive, declarative and directive were significant for

meaning in the selected political speeches of President Buhari as they contributed to his

overall victory at the presidential polls of the March 2015 general elections in Nigeria. These

speech acts reflected political language in the form of propaganda which was intended to

enlist the support of the public in the form of their votes.

Commissive acts were employed to make promises, guarantee and assure while

directives were majorly used to appeal to the conscience of Nigerians: “We in APC are

resolve to bring change to Nigeria”, “I, Muhammadu Buhari, have now come for the rescue”,

“I’m running for president to lead Nigeria to prosperity and not adversity”, “I cannot change

the past but I can change the present and future”; “Before you is a former military ruler and a

converted democrat who is ready to operate under democratic norms and is subjecting

himself to the rigours of democratic elections for the fourth time”.

Commissive acts like the first three speech acts above assured Nigerians that he was a

changed person and that his coming into power if elected will be of immense benefit to

Nigerians and not for the destruction of the country. He further assured Nigerians of his

commitment to changing the present if elected despite the acts and offences he committed as

a military general of the Nigerian Army and Head of State in the 1980s.

He used directives to appeal for votes by manipulating the conscience of Nigerians so

that even those sitting on the fence and not even sure of his candidature and personality will

vote for him. He does this by using directives to appeal and soothe the mind of Nigerians of

any form of anger and hatred towards him: “Before you is a former military ruler and a

65

converted democrat who is ready to operate under democratic norms and is subjecting

himself to the rigours of democratic elections for the fourth time”.

Expressive acts were used to appreciate Nigerians for their turn-out during the

elections and for their votes that made him president and for the peaceful manner in which

they conducted themselves during the period “You did so peacefully”. He also used this act in

appreciating former President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan for his spirit of statesmanship by

accepting defeat even when the results of the election have not been announced officially: “I

want all Nigerians to join me in congratulating and appreciating Mr. President for his

statesmanship”.

Verdictive acts were used to instruct because the atmosphere was charged and tensed

as a result of his announcement as winner: “This is not the time for confrontation”. The

declarative acts were used to confirm his stance to lead Nigeria to prosperity while assertive

acts were used to affirm and state his points and what he intends to do if elected.

On the whole, the speech acts of President Buhari’s speeches had the perlocutionary

effects of hopefulness, appeasement, cheerfulness, optimism, promising, guaranteeing, and

persuasion on his teeming supporters and Nigerians which was clearly made evident in his

victory at the polls. He was seen as the hope of Nigeria, as one coming to salvage the nation

from the impending doom in which it is headed. He gave Nigerians a sort of hope- hope for

change which would be reflected in all sectors of the nation’s life; from education, economic,

political to cultural and otherwise. It is this hope that made Nigerians to come out en-masse

to vote for him and for change.

4.3 Summary

The analysis of these five speeches of President Muhammadu Buhari revealed that the

Overall Relative Frequency Percentages (ORFPs) were: assertive (60%), directive (28%),

expressive (16%), verdictive (34%), commissive (42%) and declarative (20%). These ORFPs

66

results showed that the President used more of sentences that were assertive. It is obvious,

judging from the ORFPs that the President used assertive to state and affirm, thus, showing a

peculiar style of a “converted democrat” and a civilian politician by not using illocutionary

act of ordering and commanding which is predominant in a military era. It was also

predominant in his speeches because of his search for cooperation and acceptance from those

he wants to govern. His speeches were also distinct from that of military ruler as verdictive

and directive in them were used for appealing and requesting. The speaker also used directive

to appeal to the electorates after he was announced winner of the 2015 general elections

against any form of violence that could lead to the want of peace as the announcement made

the nation tensed and charged: “This is not the time for confrontation”.

Finally, commissive acts showed the intention of the speaker and therefore committed

him to a future course of action. He used this act to convince his listeners of his capability of

turning things around in their favour by providing them with good leadership style. These

acts were evident in extracts such as: “I intend to keep my oath and serve as President to all

Nigerians”, and “I Muhammadu Buhari have now come for the rescue”. These acts especially

commissive, and assertive had the perlocutionary effect of hopefulness on the electorates and

this was the major perlocutionary effect the President’s speeches had on the masses as

Nigerians were tired of the government led by the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) and were

in need of a change of government that will help better their lot. Nigerians want change

especially after President Jonathan’s administration failed to deliver the peoples’ mandates

which necessitated them to clamouring and voting for Muhammadu Buhari after his speeches

with the change mantra evoked high hope and aspirations in them.

67

CHAPTER FIVE: SUMMARY OF FINDINGS, CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTIONS

FOR FURTHER STUDIES

5.1 Summary of Findings

The researcher in this study undertook a pragmatic analysis of President Buhari’s

speeches during the campaign build-up of the March 2015 general elections in Nigeria. In

summarizing this study, therefore, a synthesis of the results obtained by the research and some

reflections derived from them will be offered. This thesis has been aimed primarily at

identifying the speech acts that manifest in the five purposively selected speeches of President

Buhari: Formal Declaration of Interest for Presidency, My Manifesto and Vision for Nigeria,

his speech at Chatham House, London, Acceptance speech and Inaugural speech and to

demonstrate how these speech acts project the speaker’s meaning.

The basic findings of this study began with the background of the study where

language was seen as a socio-political issue and a centrality to political stability or

polarization. The Speech Act Theory of Austin (1962) and Searle (1969) served as the

theoretical framework for the analysis of data. The choice of this framework was necessitated

because it captures the objectives of this study, in that it is a linguistic theory that looks at

what the speaker does with his words, his illocution, hence, President Buhari’s speeches were

analysed into direct and indirect illocutionary acts from which we had the illocutionary acts of

expressive, commissive, directive, declarative, verdictive and assertive. It was discovered

from the study that in the process of performing a speech act, other acts were been performed

through our identification of direct and indirect illocutionary acts in these speeches.

Also, the result of the analysis as was captured by the Overall Relative Frequency

Percentages (ORFPs) revealed a dominance of assertive and commissive acts with each

having 60% and 42% respectively. These acts were used to affirm, state, make promises and

to give assurances to Nigerians as is common with the political class especially during

68

campaign periods in order to canvass and win the support of the electorates. The speeches of

President Buhari performed different perlocutionary effect on the electorates with the

dominant perlocutionary effect of hopefulness. Nigerians were hopeful because they needed a

change that will be evident in all sector of the nation. It was this hope that made them come

out in their numbers to support the President.

In essence, this work has examined the pragmatics of President Buhari’s speeches

using the linguistic framework of the Speech Act Theory in order to identify the speech acts

used by the President and how these speech acts contributed to his overall victory at the polls.

5.2 Conclusion

The main thrust of the Speech Act Theory is to understand what the speaker does with

words. Our conclusion which derives from the results of the analysis clearly showed that

President Muhammadu Buhari employed the illocutionary acts of directive, declarative,

assertive, expressive, commissive and verdictive which were used for stating, affirming,

confirming, assuring, promising, guaranteeing and assessing. Though, it is not possible to

open up and see the heart of the President, one can judge and perceive his intentions from

these speeches. As a result of this, Nigerians are hopeful for positive change as was promised

by the President during his campaign. Finally, the time has come to deliver of his promises

and implement these changes. The people expect and hope that the situation of things in the

country will change positively as this is the major reason why their mandates were given to

him because they seek to enthrone leadership driven by patriotism and love for our dear

motherland, Nigeria.

5.3 Suggestions for Further Studies

Having considered the pragmatics of President Buhari’s speeches to a certain extent,

the researcher would not claim that all the work to be done in this study has been completed.

Therefore, this study recommends that further studies be carried out in the area of linguistic

69

stylistic analysis of President Buhari’s speeches. Also, studies should be carried out in the

analysis of President Buhari’s speeches using the Cooperative Principle of Herbert Paul Grice

and the Felicity Conditions of Austin and finally an analysis of these speeches from the

perspective of multimodal discourse analysis.

70

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APPENDICES


First I would like, Mr Chairman, if I may pay tribute to Nigerians as a whole who are

enduring all sorts of hardships and deprivations on a daily basis. Many millions are grappling

with extreme poverty and barely eking out a living. Nearly all are in fear of their lives or

safety for themselves and their families due to

· Insurgency by the godless movement called Boko Haram;

· By marauding murderers in towns and villages;

· By armed robbers on the highways;

· By kidnappers who have put whole communities to fright and sometimes to flight.

Ladies and gentlemen, it is everyone’s duty to resolve and help the national effort to

overcome these immense challenges. I would like us to place on record our appreciation for

the efforts of our Armed Forces under new leadership and police in confronting these

challenges.

I would like, secondly, to thank our supporters up and down the country for their

perseverance and resolve in face of an oppressive PDP government.

Mr Chairman, this is an occasion to celebrate our efforts and to resolve to continue until

victory is won. I humbly wish to present myself before you, before all of Nigeria and before

God seeking to be elected as APC’s Presidential candidate. Having appreciated that the only

way to relieve Nigerians of the PDP, the main opposition parties decided to pool their

strengths into one party. We have worked very hard in the last 18 months to put up structures

from the polling units to wards, local governments, states and the centre.

We have tried to ensure all processes in our party formation to be transparent and credible.

These structures will lead to free and fair polls. There is no point in holding elections if they

are not free and fair.

76

Interference in the form of rigging which PDP Government has practised since 2003 is the

worst form of injustice – denying people their right to express their opinions. Whether they

like it or not, injustice cannot endure.

Since 1999 PDP has presided over our country’s decline. Nigeria in my experience has never

been so divided, so polarized by an unthinking government hell bent on ruling and stealing

forever whatever befalls the country. Mr Chairman, we in APC are resolved to stop them in

their tracks and rescue Nigeria from the stranglehold of PDP.

The last 16 years of PDP Government has witnessed decline in all critical sectors of life in

Nigeria

· There is now general insecurity in the land

Quite apart from Boko Haram, there is prevalence of Armed Robbery, kidnappings and

killings, cattle rustling, market and farmland arson.

These outrages have taken a new and a frightening dimension, disrupting economic and

social life across whole communities.

· The economy continues to deteriorate while the Government continues to announce

fantastic growth figures but manufacturing is down, agriculture is down, commerce is down

Simply because you sell oil and steal part of the money does not entitle you to cook figures

and announce phantom economic growth when all the major indices namely,

· Employment

· Manufacturing

· Farming

· Trading

are demonstrably on the decline.

77

· When PDP came to power in 1999 Nigeria was generating about 4,000 M/W of electricity.

After 15 years and $20 billion spent we are generating between 3,000 – 4,000 M/W. No

failure is more glaring than this.

We in APC are resolved to bring change to Nigeria. We plan to do things differently.

We plan to put priority on

· Protection of lives and property.

· Pursuing economic policies for shared prosperity and immediate attention on youth

employment.

· Quality education for development, modernity and social mobility.

· Agricultural productivity for taking millions out of poverty and ensuring food security.

· Reviving Industry to generate employment and “make things” not just to remain hawkers of

other peoples’ goods.

· Developing solid minerals exploitation which will substantially attract employment and

revenue for government.

· Restoring honour and integrity to public service by keeping the best and attracting the best.

· Tackling corruption which has become blatant and widespread. The rest of the world looks

at Nigeria as the home of corruption. Nigeria is a country where stealing is not corruption.

· Last, (but not the least or final) respecting the constitutional separation of powers between

the executive, legislatures and judiciary and respecting the rights of citizens.

Mr Chairman, there, in outline are some policy proposals about the direction APC should

take when, by the grace of God, we are given the responsibility of serving Nigeria in

Government.

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Securing our Nation, prospering our People, To Change Politics and Governance, Security

and Conflict Resolution, The Economy and Infrastructure Base, The Society and Human

Capital Development, The Environment

MY COMMITMENT TO NIGERIA

Preamble

1. Every country has its ‘lost generation’. Some were stolen away by war, some by economic

downturns, and some by governments. Nigeria is perhaps the only country stolen by a cabal

of political Mafias, merely for power, money, leisure and privilege. When the British

administrators lowered the Union Jack in Lagos on October 1, 1960, Nigeria was Africa’s

greatest hope. Its pool of talent mass of fertile land, and its newly discovered oil wealth,

promised economic transformation and the role of leading the then independent African

nations and those who were still struggling for freedom, under different forms of colonialism,

to eventually lead the African Continent, onto the global stage.

2. Now, over fifty years of independence and despite our vast wealth – abundant natural and

human resources, at home and abroad, we as a nation continue to struggle with the most basic

needs (food, shelter, water, security sanitation, and electricity, etc). As a nation, we are

paralyzed by wide spread poverty, endemic institutionalised corruption; high levels of

unemployment; a near total collapse of our educational system and facilities, collapse and

decaying health and ineffective social services systems, chaotic transportation and

communications systems; and other basic but essential infrastructure; less than adequate

institutions of government at all levels, resulting to break down of law and order,

institutionalized insecurity to life and property; and weak, fragile and unstable economy, with

non-functional financial institutions, etc.

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3. Today, hospitals and universities are struggling with obsolete skills of by-gone centuries;

insurgency controls large chunks of the Nigerian territories, kidnapping is now a profession

and a cottage industry. For the little and common man and women who helped build this

nation, things have never been so bad for these fellows. But for the corrupt politicians and big

moneys bags, things have never been better.

4. Many Nigerians have completely lost faith in the country’s ability to govern itself.

Nigerians have fundamentally, lost faith in the leaders at the helm of the nation’s affairs. The

lack of confidence in the system and its leaders, erodes democratic principles thus further

jeopardizing the country’s future.

5. Nigerians of goodwill, are angered by failures of corrupt and poor leadership. They are

frustrated by economic policies that did not deliver on its promises. Nigerians are therefore

impatient and want to regain their lost rights. Nigerians are worn out by conflicts, all over the

country. Nigerians are now striving for a fresh start. This start must come from a new team,

new ideas, that are committed to the promotion of acceptable and sustainable reforms. The

mood now in Nigeria is changing as people begin to speak out more confidently against

corruption, human rights abuses, and are not afraid to criticize and critique the unpopular

policies of government. Throughout Nigeria there is ongoing debate on what is critical to the

future of the country: CHANGE! POSITIVE CHANGE!!

6. What is certain in Nigeria today is that the ebtire country is in need of being fixed. The

truth of the matter is that Nigeria today has all the indices for both success and failure.

Skewing the role of the State towards serving special interests, dividing its citizens along

ethnic and religious lines, trapping whole generations into avoidable poverty through

educating the young with basically, no skill, etc., are all attempt to perpetually one set of

corrupt leaders in power, forever, these are the indices of a failed state. However, assuming

the will to power, by this other Nigeria, to remove the incompetent, corrupt leaders, with no

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progressive ideals, is the success side. The making of this competent team has become more

urgent and imperative, but this can only be achieved through resilience and courage. I,

Muhammadu Buhari have now come for the rescue. This is success by design. It will

overcome our failure by design matrix.

7. The challenge, and choice facing all Nigerians at home and abroad is whether Nigerians

have enough will and courage to unite, and resolve to radically move the nation forward –not

looking backward to practices of a failed past, but building bridges to the positive fatherhood,

motherhood, brother and sisterhood of the future! Again, my teaming supports are already

leading the way to this possibility.

8. As a nation and the Sub Saharan Africa’s leading energy producer, we had in the past

squandered the opportunity to build functional infrastructure to better the lives of the average

Nigerian. We can no longer afford this luxury of inactivity. We must revive our public and

private sectors in order to provide functional services and secure the good of the individual

Nigerian and his or her family.

We are here commited to Change Nigeria:

December 10, 2014 is our Primaries Day. February 2015 will bring be our Presidential

elections. As you know, the general trust level of politics, politicians and political leaders, is

at an all time low. One may ask why? And we can as well understand why! After years of

broken promises, hyper-corruption, the feeling that politicians have become too remote from

the people, etc., it is no wonder that Nigerians have completely lost faith in the country’s

ability to govern itself not just because of the problems facing the country, but the lack of

faith in the present set of leaders at the helm of affairs.

The challenge, facing all of us as Nigerians is whether there is enough will and courage

amongst us as citizens to unite, commit and resolve to radically reform, modernise and move

the nation forward.

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I, Muhammadu Buhari, have resolved that the task ahead of me is that of Securing our Nation

and Prospering our people –not looking backward to the failed policies and promises of the

past. As I noted before, it is no longer a question of choice but that of the will and courage.

This document sets out our side of the bargain: the things I as your future president, want to

do to change Nigeria for the better. I will however warn you all: I cannot do this a lone. Each

one of you and I must work together to get our economy on the right track, mend our broken

lives, infrastructure, institutions, and the overall society. You must help me to reform our

rotten political system, by getting involved, taking responsibility, and working together as a

team.

I, Muhammadu Buhari believe that our politity, is broken. Our nation is in urgent need of a

fundamental political reform. This requires honesty, integrity and forthrightness in order to

improve governance, so as to make it transparent and accountable to the all Nigerian. Make

me your Presidential candidate in both the Primaries and the Presidential elections.

THIS IS HOW I, WITH YOUR HELP, WILL FIX IT:

Politics and Governance

On Politics and Governance:

I, Muhammadu Buhari, believe that our politics is broken. Our nation urgently needs

fundamental political reform and improvement in governance more transparency and

accountable. If you nominate me in December, 2014 and elect me in February 2015, my

administration will:

1. Initiate action to amend the Nigerian Constitution with a view to devolving powers, duties,

and responsibilities to states in order to entrench true Federalism and the Federal spirit;

2. Strengthen INEC to reduce, if possible, eliminate electoral malpractices in Nigerian’s

political life;

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3. Attract the best and brightest of our sons and daughters into our politics and public service

by aggressive recruitment of private sector people, academics, and professionals within

Nigeria and in the Diaspora through internships, fellowships, executive appointments, and

special nomination to contest elective offices;

4. Prevent the abuse and misuse of Executive, Legislative and Public offices, through greater

accountability, transparency, strict, and implementable anti-corruption laws, through

strengthening and sanitising the EFCC and ICPC as independent entities;

5. Amend the Constitution to remove immunity from prosecution for elected officers in

criminal cases;

6. Restructure governance for a leaner, more efficient, and adequately compensated public

service sector, while promoting effective participation of the private sector for more robust

job creation programmes to employ the teaming youth.;

7. Require full disclosure in media outlets, of all government contracts over N100m prior to

award and during implementation at regular intervals;

8. Reform and Strengthen the Justice System for efficient administration and dispensation of

justice with the creation of special courts for accelerated hearing of corruption, drug

trafficking, terrorism and similar cases of national importance;

9. Fully enforce the Freedom of Information Act l so that government held data sets can be

requested and used by the public and then such data sets be publish on regular basis;

10. Amend the Constitution to require Local governments to publish their meeting minutes,

service performance data, and items of spending over N10M.

Security and Conflict Resolution

On National Security and Defence:

I will urgently secure the territorial integrity of the nation. I will never leave the defence of

the nation in the hands of Hunters, Children, and Civilian JTF through the following:

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1. Urgently address capacity building mechanisms of law enforcement agents in terms of

quantity and quality as this is critical in safeguarding the sanctity of lives and property;

2. Establish a well trained, adequately equipped and goals driven Serious Crime Squad to

combat insurgencies, kidnapping, armed robbery, ethno-religious and communal clashes,

nationwide;

3. Consult and amend the Constitution to enable States and Local Governments to create city,

Local government and State Policing systems, base on the resources available at each levels,

to address the peculiar needs of each community. I will therefore work with the National

Assembly to set and revised, when needed, boundaries of operations, for Federal, State, and

Local government policing units, through new Criminal Justice legislation to replace the

Criminal Code, the Penal Code and the Police Act.

4. I will push for more robust support in the Security and Economic stability of the West-

African sub-region and African Continent as a whole. I will seek and maintain close and

frank relationship with ALL of West Africa; Special relationship with South Africa and its

Sub-region; UK, USA, Canada, EU, Asia, and the Middle East .

ON CONFLICT RESOLUTION, NATIONAL UNITY, AND SOCIAL HARMONY:

I will;

1. Establish a Conflict Resolution Commission to help prevent, mitigate, and resolve civil

conflicts within the polity;

2. Bring permanent peace and solution to the insurgency issues in the North-East; the Niger

Delta; and other conflict prone states and areas such as Plateau, Benue, Bauchi, Borno, Abia,

Taraba, Yobe, and Kaduna in order to engender national unity and social harmony;

3. Initiate policies to ensure that Nigerians are free to live and work in any part of the country

by removing state of origin, tribe, ethnic and religious affiliations from documentation

requirements in our identification of citizens and replace these with State of Residence and

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fashion out the appropriate minimal qualification for obtaining such a state of residency,

nation-wide.

On Foreign Policy:

I will;

1. Make regional integration a priority within ECOWAS including free trade with a view to

ensuring that common tariff currency are in use by the end of my term in office, under

Nigeria’s guidance and leadership, base on the size of its market force;

2. Maintain a strong, close and frank relationship within the Gulf of Guinea, the

Commonwealth, South Africa and the rest of the world.

3. Establish a special relationship with the leading emerging markets like Brazil; Russia,

India and China (BRIC) and other strategic partners around the world.

The Economy & Infrastructure Base

On the Economy:

I will;

1. Maintain sound Micro and macro-economic policy environment, and run an efficient

government and preserve the independence of the Central Bank;

2. Restore financial confidence in the citizens and the world, by putting in place a more

robust monitoring, supervising, and regulating of the financial institutions;

3. Make our economy one of the fastest growing emerging economies in the world with a real

GDP growth averaging at least 10-12% annually

4. As at 1999, Nigerian rate of unemployment stood at about 8%, today it is estimated from

official statistics to be close to 30%. I will embark on vocational training, entrepreneurial and

skills acquisition scheme for graduates along with the creation of Small Business Loan

Guarantee Scheme to create at least 5 million new jobs by 2019. A Small and Medium

Enterprises Development Commission will be created for this purpose. I will also encourage

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State Governments to focus on employment creation, by matching everyone job created in the

same state.

5. Integrate the informal economy into the mainstream and prioritize the full implementation

of the National Identification Scheme to generate the relevant data;

6. Expand domestic demand and will undertake associated public works programmes to

achieve this goal;

7. Embark on export and production diversification including investment in infrastructure;

promote manufacturing, through Agro Based industries; and expand and promote sub-

regional trade through ECOWAS and AU;

8. Make Information Technology, Manufacturing, Agriculture and Entertainment key drivers

of our economy, by reviewing the present reward system, which is based on certification, to

that based on skills, competencies, and performances;

9. Balance the Nigerian economy across regions by the creation of 6 Regional Economic

Development Agencies (REDAs) to act as sub-regional hubs in order to promote healthy

regional competitiveness;

Put in place a N300bn Regional Growth Fund with an average of N50bn in each geo-political

region; to be managed by the REDAs, to encourage private sector enterprise and to support

places currently reliant on only on the public sector, to migrate to a private sector reality;

Amend the Constitution and the

10. Land Use Act to create freehold/leasehold interests in land along with matching grants for

states to create a nationwide electronic land title register on a state by state basis;

11. Create an additional middle-class of at least 4 million new home owners by 2019 by

enacting a national mortgage single digit interest rates for purchase of owner occupier houses

as well as review the collateral qualification to make funding for home ownership easier, with

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a 15 to 30 year mortgage terms. This will equally help our banking system migrate from short

to long term perspective of their role in sustaining the economy.

12. Create a Social Welfare Program of at least Five Thousand Naira (N5000) that will cater

for the 25 million poorest and most vulnerable citizens upon the demonstration of children’s

enrolment in school and evidence of immunisation to help promote family stability.

13. Provide allowances to the discharged but unemployed Youth Corps members for Twelve

(12) months while in the skills and entrepreneurial development programmes.

On Agriculture:

I will;

1. Modernize the sector and change Nigeria from being a country of self-subsistence farmers

to that of a medium/large scale farming nation/producer;

2. Create a nationwide food inspectorate division with a view to improving nutrition and

eliminating food-borne hazards

3. Inject sufficient funds to the Agricultural sector to create more agro-allied jobs by way of

loans at nominal interest rates for capital investment on medium and commercial scale cash

crops;

4. Guarantee a minimum price for all cash crops and facilitate storage of agricultural products

to overcome seasonal shortages of selected food crops.

5. Move the nation to an all year round small, medium, and commercial farming through a

coordinated integrative irrigation of our existing dams as well as creation of more dam to

collect the over flooding waters, nationwide.

6. Revive our Agricultural Research Institutes that are in a state of comatose;

7. Review and strengthened Veterinary practices nationwide.

On Infrastructure:

I will;

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1. Review the Public Private Partnership (PPP) enabling environment with a view to

addressing the legal, regulatory and operational bottlenecks, challenging the effective

administration of the system, by introducing enabling legislation. In addition, I will create a

National Infrastructural Development Bank to provide loans at nominal interest rates,

exclusively for this sector;

2. Generate, transmit and distribute electricity on a 24/7 basis whilst simultaneously ensuring

the development of sustainable/renewable energy, by 2019.

3. Embark on a National Infrastructural Development Programme as a Public Private

Partnership that will

(a) ensure 5,000km of Superhighway including service trunks and

(b) building of up to 6,800km of modern railway completed by 2019;

4. Enact new legal and regulatory frameworks to establish independent regulation and

incentives to accelerate public and private sector investment in seaports, railways, and inland

waterways;

5. Embark on PPP schemes that will ensure every one of the 36 states has one functional

airport, with all 21st Century safety tools for effective commercial air travel.

On the Oil and Gas Industry:

I will;

1. Revive and reactivate our minimally performing Refineries to optimum capacity;

2. Make the industry and Nigeria one of the world leading/cutting edge centres for clean oil

and gas technology; also producing leading world Oil and Gas technologist, scientists, and

owing mega structure installations, drilling, processing, and production facilities and

engineers. These facilities and scientists will be supported with the best services and research

facilities.

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3. Fully develop the sector’s capacity to absorb more of the nation’s new graduate in the

labour market. The sector will be funded to produce more home-grown, but world class

engineers, scientists, technologist, etc.;

4. Modernise the NNPC and make it the national energy champion. I will consider breaking it

up into more efficient, commercially driven units; and may strip it of its regulatory powers,

so as to enable it tap into international capital market;

5. Enforce the government master plan for oil companies to end flaring that pollutes the air

and damages the communities and people’s health and ensure that they sell at least half of

their gas produced within Nigeria;

6. Speedily pass the much-delayed Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) and ensure that local

content issues are fully addressed

7. Make Nigeria the world’s leading exporter of LNG through the creation of strategic

partnerships.

The Society & Human Capital Development

On Education:

I will;

1. Fully review provisions of the Universal Basic Education Act with emphasis on gender

equity in primary, secondary school enrolment whilst improving the quality and substance of

our schools, through outcome based education, that address the individual, family, and

societal roles in education; and the associative skills and competencies that go with these

responsibilities;

2. Targeting up to 20% of our annual budget for this critical sector whilst making substantial

investments in training quality teachers at all levels of the educational system;

3. Implement a performance based education, predicated on outcomes, skills, and

competences as against the current certificate based qualification. I will adjust the reward

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system accordingly too. This way, exams malpractice and certificate forgery will be resolved

once and for all. Young men and women interested in real liberal arts education, based on a

true understanding of scientific, the humanistic, and the social sciences will fill our

classrooms to be prepared for future leadership of the nation;

4. Enhance teacher training and improve the competence of teachers in the light of the 21st

Century and beyond understanding of the learner types, intelligence types, as the multiple

assessment types, in order to open up learning for all our children types. The era of one

student type will give way to an all learner type for our children and young people as well as

adults who want to return to the classroom to sharpen their skills, competencies, and

sensibilities. This re-engineering of our education will be followed with a clearly thought out

and vigorous national inspection programmes;

5. Make learning experiences more meaningful for children as the nation’s education will no

longer be a preparation for life, but life itself. Our children will be democratised for

education, rather than be educated for democracy. This view of education will make

educating our children more cost-effective in the long run;

6. Provide One Meal a day for all Primary school pupils. That will create jobs in Agriculture,

Catering, and Delivery Services

7. Develop and promote effective use of innovative teaching methods/materials in our

schools;

8. Ensure a greater proportion of expenditure on university education is devoted to helping

our youth to understand the juxtaposition of Science, Technology, the Humanities and the

Social Sciences.

9. Establish at least six new universities of Science and Technology with satellite campuses

in various states. These six universities should be fully equipped with ICT technologies in

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order to attract and encourage small and medium scale ICT enterprises after their university

education;

10. Establish technical colleges and vocational centres in each state of the federation;

11. Provide more conducive environment for private sector participation in all levels of

education. Re-authorised the NUC, TETFUN, JAMB, etc, Acts to enable Private institutions

of Higher learning to benefit from research funds and programmes that will serve the national

good;

12. Establish six centers of excellence to address the needs of special education;

On Healthcare:

I will;

1. Prioritise the reduction of the infant mortality rate substantially; reduce maternal mortality

rates to the levels acceptable by the World Health Organisation; reduce HIV/AIDS and other

infectious diseases drastically and improve life expectancy by an additional 10 years on

average through our National Healthy Living program;

2. Increase the number of physicians from 19 per 1000 population to 50 per 1000 through

deliberate medication education as epitomize by nations such as Ghana. I will increase

national health expenditure per person per annum to about N50,000 (from the less than

N10,000 currently);

3. Increase the quality of all federal government owned hospitals to world class standard by

2019;

4. Invest in cutting edge technology such as tele-medicine in all major health centers in the

country through partnership programmes with communities and the private sector;

5. Provide free ante-natal care for pregnant women; free health care for babies and children

up to school going age and for the aged; and free treatment for those afflicted with infectious

diseases such as tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS;

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6. Boost the local manufacture of pharmaceuticals and make non adulterated drugs readily

available.

Set an effective prosecution and punishment systems, for those importing or adulterating

drugs in the country.

7. The enhancement of the Epidemiological Units / Centres for Diseas Control to meet up

with Global standards in containment of disease outbreaks, proper vaccine storage and

research;

8. Create an Insurance Policy for our Journalists as the nation faces hard times and our

Journalists faces more dangers in the discharge of their investigative work, to educate

Nigerians in their rights and responsibilities.

On Youth, Sports and Culture:

I will;

1. Provide the opportunities such as setting up functional recreational facilities, Library with

e-services, Community Centers, in collaboration with States, Local Government Authorities,

Local Development Areas, etc for youth to realize, harness, and develop their potentials to

the fullest, in order to facilitate the emergence of the new generation of citizens, who will be

committed to the sustenance of good governance and service to the people and the country;

2. Establish Zonal world-class sports academies and training institutes and ensure that

Nigeria occupies a place of pride in global sports and athletics;

3. Revive and restructure the Nigerian Football League and put incentives in place to make it

as competitive as other national leagues

4. Put in place measures to identify talents early and ensure their participation in local and

international games to enable them to be true professionals;

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5. Help as well as mandate schools and communities to create neighborhood

playgrounds/sports centre. I will create matching support funds for communities to acquire

the needed equipment to develop skills and competencies;

6. Assist Nollywood to fully develop into world class movie industry that can compete

effectively with Hollywood and Bollywood in due course. I will support the creative and

performing arts with the necessary environment where by our great entertainers do not end

their lives in abject poverty as is currently the case.

On Women Empowerment

I will;

1. Ensure the rights of women are protected as enshrined in our Constitution;

2. Guarantee that women are adequately represented in government appointments and

provide greater opportunities in education, Job creation, and economic empowerment;

3. Recognize and protect women empowerment and gender equality with special emphasis on

economic activities in the rural areas;

4. Use the Party structures to promote the concept of reserving a minimum number of seats in

the States and National Assembly, for women.

The Environment

On the Environment:

I will;

1. Ensure compliance with policies and measures to halt the pollution of rivers and

waterways in the Niger Delta and the other parts of the country;

2. Create shelter belts in states bordering the Sahara Desert to mitigate and reverse the effects

of the expanding desert

3. Support and accelerate the implementation of regional water transport initiatives across the

country through effective dredging of the main waterways ;

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4. Adopt a holistic approach to erosion and shoreline protection across the country;

5. Create teams of volunteers to plant and nurture economically viable trees in arid regions;

6. Restructure the Ecological Fund Office to enable it meet today’s environmental

challenges;

7. Regulate the timber industry to ensure that double the numbers of trees felled are planted

by the loggers;

8. Ensure full compliance with town-planning and environmental laws and edicts.

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Prospects for Democratic Consolidation in Africa: Nigeria’s Transition.

Permit me to start by thanking Chatham House for the invitation to talk about this important

topic at this crucial time. When speaking about Nigeria overseas, I normally prefer to be my

country’s public relations and marketing officer, extolling her virtues and hoping to attract

investments and tourists. But as we all know, Nigeria is now battling with many challenges,

and if I refer to them, I do so only to impress on our friends in the United Kingdom that we

are quite aware of our shortcomings and are doing our best to address them.

The 2015 general election in Nigeria is generating a lot of interests within and outside the

country. This is understandable. Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country and largest

economy, is at a defining moment, a moment that has great implications beyond the

democratic project and beyond the borders of my dear country.

So let me say upfront that the global interest in Nigeria’s landmark election is not misplaced

at all and indeed should be commended; for this is an election that has serious import for the

world. I urge the international community to continue to focus on Nigeria at this very critical

moment. Given increasing global linkages, it is in our collective interests that the postponed

elections should hold on the rescheduled dates; that they should be free and fair; that their

outcomes should be respected by all parties; and that any form of extension, under whichever

guise, is unconstitutional and will not be tolerated.

With the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, the dissolution of the USSR in 1991, the collapse of

communism and the end of the Cold War, democracy became the dominant and most

preferred system of government across the globe. That global transition has been aptly

captured as the triumph of democracy and the ‘most pre-eminent political idea of our time.’

On a personal note, the phased end of the USSR was a turning point for me. It convinced me

that change can be brought about without firing a single shot.

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As you all know, I had been a military head of state in Nigeria for twenty months. We

intervened because we were unhappy with the state of affairs in our country. We wanted to

arrest the drift. Driven by patriotism, influenced by the prevalence and popularity of such

drastic measures all over Africa and elsewhere, we fought our way to power. But the global

triumph of democracy has shown that another and a preferable path to change is possible. It is

an important lesson I have carried with me since, and a lesson that is not lost on the African

continent.

In the last two decades, democracy has grown strong roots in Africa. Elections, once so rare,

are now so commonplace. As at the time I was a military head of state between 1983 and

1985, only four African countries held regular multi-party elections. But the number of

electoral democracies in Africa, according to Freedom House, jumped to 10 in 1992/1993

then to 18 in 1994/1995 and to 24 in 2005/2006. According to the New York Times, 42 of the

48 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa conducted multi-party elections between 1990 and 2002.

The newspaper also reported that between 2000 and 2002, ruling parties in four African

countries (Senegal, Mauritius, Ghana and Mali) peacefully handed over power to victorious

opposition parties. In addition, the proportion of African countries categorized as not free by

Freedom House declined from 59% in 1983 to 35% in 2003. Without doubt, Africa has been

part of the current global wave of democratisation.

But the growth of democracy on the continent has been uneven. According to Freedom

House, the number of electoral democracies in Africa slipped from 24 in 2007/2008 to 19 in

2011/2012; while the percentage of countries categorised as ‘not free’ assuming for the sake

of argument that we accept their definition of “free” increased from 35% in 2003 to 41% in

2013. Also, there have been some reversals at different times in Burkina Faso, Central

African Republic, Cote D’Ivoire, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Lesotho, Mali, Madagascar,

Mauritania and Togo. We can choose to look at the glass of democracy in Africa as either

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half full or half empty.

While you can’t have representative democracy without elections, it is equally important to

look at the quality of the elections and to remember that mere elections do not democracy

make. It is globally agreed that democracy is not an event, but a journey. And that the

destination of that journey is democratic consolidation – that state where democracy has

become so rooted and so routine and widely accepted by all actors.

With this important destination in mind, it is clear that though many African countries now

hold regular elections, very few of them have consolidated the practice of democracy. It is

important to also state at this point that just as with elections, a consolidated democracy

cannot be an end by itself. I will argue that it is not enough to hold a series of elections or

even to peacefully alternate power among parties.

It is much more important that the promise of democracy goes beyond just allowing people to

freely choose their leaders. It is much more important that democracy should deliver on the

promise of choice, of freedoms, of security of lives and property, of transparency and

accountability, of rule of law, of good governance and of shared prosperity. It is very

important that the promise embedded in the concept of democracy, the promise of a better life

for the generality of the people, is not delivered in the breach.

Now, let me quickly turn to Nigeria. As you all know, Nigeria’s fourth republic is in its 16th

year and this general election will be the fifth in a row. This is a major sign of progress for us,

given that our first republic lasted five years and three months, the second republic ended

after four years and two months and the third republic was a still-birth. However, longevity is

not the only reason why everyone is so interested in this election.

The major difference this time around is that for the very first time since transition to civil

rule in 1999, the ruling Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) is facing its stiffest opposition so

far from our party the All Progressives Congress (APC). We once had about 50 political

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parties, but with no real competition. Now Nigeria is transitioning from a dominant party

system to a competitive electoral polity, which is a major marker on the road to democratic

consolidation. As you know, peaceful alternation of power through competitive elections

have happened in Ghana, Senegal, Malawi and Mauritius in recent times. The prospects of

democratic consolidation in Africa will be further brightened when that eventually happens in

Nigeria.

But there are other reasons why Nigerians and the whole world are intensely focussed on this

year’s elections, chief of which is that the elections are holding in the shadow of huge

security, economic and social uncertainties in Africa’s most populous country and largest

economy. On insecurity, there is a genuine cause for worry, both within and outside Nigeria.

Apart from the civil war era, at no other time in our history has Nigeria been this insecure.

Boko Haram has sadly put Nigeria on the terrorism map, killing more than 13,000 of our

nationals, displacing millions internally and externally, and at a time holding on to portions of

our territory the size of Belgium. What has been consistently lacking is the required

leadership in our battle against insurgency. I, as a retired general and a former head of state,

have always known about our soldiers: they are capable, well trained, patriotic, brave and

always ready to do their duty in the service of our country.

You all can bear witness to the gallant role of our military in Burma, the Democratic

Republic of Congo, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Darfur and in many other peacekeeping operations

in several parts of the world. But in the matter of this insurgency, our soldiers have neither

received the necessary support nor the required incentives to tackle this problem. The

government has also failed in any effort towards a multi-dimensional response to this

problem leading to a situation in which we have now become dependent on our neighbours to

come to our rescue.

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Let me assure you that if I am elected president, the world will have no cause to worry about

Nigeria as it has had to recently; that Nigeria will return to its stabilising role in West Africa;

and that no inch of Nigerian territory will ever be lost to the enemy because we will pay

special attention to the welfare of our soldiers in and out of service, we will give them

adequate and modern arms and ammunitions to work with, we will improve intelligence

gathering and border controls to choke Boko Haram’s financial and equipment channels, we

will be tough on terrorism and tough on its root causes by initiating a comprehensive

economic development plan promoting infrastructural development, job creation, agriculture

and industry in the affected areas. We will always act on time and not allow problems to

irresponsibly fester, and I, Muhammadu Buhari, will always lead from the front and return

Nigeria to its leadership role in regional and international efforts to combat terrorism.

On the economy, the fall in prices of oil has brought our economic and social stress into full

relief. After the rebasing exercise in April 2014, Nigeria overtook South Africa as Africa’s

largest economy. Our GDP is now valued at $510 billion and our economy rated 26th in the

world. Also on the bright side, inflation has been kept at single digit for a while and our

economy has grown at an average of 7% for about a decade.

But it is more of paper growth, a growth that, on account of mismanagement, profligacy and

corruption, has not translated to human development or shared prosperity. A development

economist once said three questions should be asked about a country’s development: one,

what is happening to poverty? Two, what is happening to unemployment? And three, what is

happening to inequality?

The answers to these questions in Nigeria show that the current administration has created

two economies in one country, a sorry tale of two nations: one economy for a few who have

so much in their tiny island of prosperity; and the other economy for the many who have so

little in their vast ocean of misery.

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Even by official figures, 33.1% of Nigerians live in extreme poverty. That’s at almost 60

million, almost the population of the United Kingdom. There is also the unemployment crisis

simmering beneath the surface, ready to explode at the slightest stress, with officially 23.9%

of our adult population and almost 60% of our youth unemployed. We also have one of the

highest rates of inequalities in the world.

With all these, it is not surprising that our performance on most governance and development

indicators (like Mo Ibrahim Index on African Governance and UNDP’s Human Development

Index.) are unflattering. With fall in the prices of oil, which accounts for more than 70% of

government revenues and lack of savings from more than a decade of oil boom, the poor will

be disproportionately impacted.

In the face of dwindling revenues, a good place to start the repositioning of Nigeria’s

economy is to swiftly tackle two ills that have ballooned under the present administration:

waste and corruption. And in doing this, I will, if elected, lead the way, with the force of

personal example.

On corruption, there will be no confusion as to where I stand. Corruption will have no place

and the corrupt will not be appointed into my administration. First and foremost, we will plug

the holes in the budgetary process. Revenue producing entities such as NNPC and Customs

and Excise will have one set of books only. Their revenues will be publicly disclosed and

regularly audited. The institutions of state dedicated to fighting corruption will be given

independence and prosecutorial authority without political interference.

But I must emphasise that any war waged on corruption should not be misconstrued as

settling old scores or a witch-hunt. I’m running for President to lead Nigeria to prosperity and

not adversity.

In reforming the economy, we will use savings that arise from blocking these leakages and

the proceeds recovered from corruption to fund our party’s social investments programmes in

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education, health, and safety nets such as free school meals for children, emergency public

works for unemployed youth and pensions for the elderly.

As a progressive party, we must reform our political economy to unleash the pent-up

ingenuity and productivity of the Nigerian people thus freeing them from the curse of

poverty. We will run a private sector-led economy but maintain an active role for government

through strong regulatory oversight and deliberate interventions and incentives to diversify

the base of our economy, strengthen productive sectors, improve the productive capacities of

our people and create jobs for our teeming youths.

In short, we will run a functional economy driven by a worldview that sees growth not as an

end by itself, but as a tool to create a society that works for all, rich and poor alike. On March

28, Nigeria has a decision to make. To vote for the continuity of failure or to elect

progressive change. I believe the people will choose wisely.

In sum, I think that given its strategic importance, Nigeria can trigger a wave of democratic

consolidation in Africa. But as a starting point we need to get this critical election right by

ensuring that they go ahead, and depriving those who want to scuttle it the benefit of

derailing our fledgling democracy. That way, we will all see democracy and democratic

consolidation as tools for solving pressing problems in a sustainable way, not as ends in

themselves.

Permit me to close this discussion on a personal note. I have heard and read references to me

as a former dictator in many respected British newspapers, including the well regarded

Economist. Let me say without sounding defensive that dictatorship goes with military rule,

though some might be less dictatorial than others. I take responsibility for whatever happened

under my watch.

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I cannot change the past. But I can change the present and the future. So before you is a

former military ruler and a converted democrat who is ready to operate under democratic

norms and is subjecting himself to the rigours of democratic elections for the fourth time.

You may ask: why is he doing this? This is a question I ask myself all the time too. And here

is my humble answer: because the work of making Nigeria great is not yet done, because I

still believe that change is possible, this time through the ballot, and most importantly,

because I still have the capacity and the passion to dream and work for a Nigeria that will be

respected again in the comity of nations and that all Nigerians will be proud of.

I thank you for listening.

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Your Excellency, the Vice President elect, Professor Yemi Osinbajo, your Excellency, Chief

Rotimi Amaechi, the Director General of APC Presidential Campaign, 2015, your

Excellency, the former Governor of Edo State and National Chairman of our great party, your

Excellency the Governor Imo State, Rochas Okorocha, your Excellency, the former Governor

of Imo State, Dr Ogbonaya Onu, Your Excellency, the former Governor of Ekiti State,

Engineer Oni, your Excellency the former Governor of Kwara, Bokola Saraki, your

Excellency, the Speaker of the House of Representative, Honourable Aminu Tambuwal,

Please, let me stand on existing protocol.

Focus words of General Muhammadu Buhari’s speech

At exactly 5:15 yesterday (Tuesday) evening, President Jonathan called to congratulate me on

my victory.

For this, I want all Nigerians to join me in congratulating and appreciating Mr. President for

his statesmanship.

President Jonathan was a worthy opponent; I extend my hand of fellowship to him.

I look forward to meeting him soon, as we plan the transition from one administration to

another.

He will receive nothing but cooperation and understanding from me, who led this nation to

democracy.

You stood in line patiently for hours, in the rain, in the sun and then in the dark to cast your

votes. Even when the vote was extended to Sunday in some place, you still performed your

civic duties. You did so peacefully.

You voted with your heart. Your vote affirms that you believe Nigeria’s future can be better

than what it is today.

You voted for change and now change has come.

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INEC has released the official result of the Presidential Election. INEC has declared that I

gained the most votes with the required spread ad won this election

In a more profound way, it is you, Nigerians, that have won.

The people have shown their love for our nation, and their believe in democracy.

The declaration of INEC accurately reflects the will of the people.

While there might have been some logistical obstacles and irregularities associated with the

exercise, the result shall stand as what the people want.

I thank all Nigerians who have made this day possible, our country has now joined the

community of nations that have used the ballot box to physically change an incumbent

president in a free and fair election.

To me, this is indeed historic.

Most people will welcome the result because it is the one they voted for. Others will literally

be disappointed. I ask that we all be circumspect, respectful and peaceful in these times. This

was a hard-fought contest. Emotions were high. We must not allow them to get the better of

us.

This is not the time for confrontation. This is a moment that we must begin to heal the

wounds and work toward a better future.

We do this first by extending a hand of friendship and conciliation across the political divide.

We hope and pray our friends in other parties reciprocate.

I thank all members of the All Progressives Congress, the APC, for their commitment and

their hard work through the formation of the party, the campaigns and the presidential

elections.

Let me equally express my appreciation to the media, civil society and security agencies for

their selfless service. The international press and our friends abroad deserve a fair

commendation for their support throughout the process.

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We promise a robust and dynamic engagement with your countries in matters of mutual

interest.

In the interim, I call on all Nigerians to be law abiding and peaceful.

The eyes of the world were focussed on us to see if we can vote in a peaceful way and carry

out elections in an orderly manner.

We have proven to the world that we are a people who have embraced democracy and a

people who seek a government by, for and of the people.

We have put one party state behind us. We have voted for a government that will serve and

govern, but will never rule over you.

CHANGE has come and a new day and a new Nigeria is upon us.

The victory is yours and the glory is that of our nation, NIGERIA.

I will make a more formal address to the nation, later in the afternoon after I receive the

certificate of return from the INEC.

May God Bless the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

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I am immensely grateful to God Who Has preserved us to witness this day and this occasion.

Today marks a triumph for Nigeria and an occasion to celebrate her freedom and cherish her

democracy. Nigerians have shown their commitment to democracy and are determined to

entrench its culture. Our journey has not been easy but thanks to the determination of our

people and strong support from friends abroad we have today a truly democratically elected

government in place.

I would like to thank President Goodluck Jonathan for his display of statesmanship in setting

a precedent for us that has now made our people proud to be Nigerians wherever they are.

With the support and cooperation he has given to the transition process, he has made it

possible for us to show the world that despite the perceived tension in the land we can be a

united people capable of doing what is right for our nation. Together we co-operated to

surprise the world that had come to expect only the worst from Nigeria. I hope this act of

graciously accepting defeat by the outgoing President will become the standard of political

conduct in the country.

I would like to thank the millions of our supporters who believed in us even when the cause

seemed hopeless. I salute their resolve in waiting long hours in rain and hot sunshine to

register and cast their votes and stay all night if necessary to protect and ensure their votes

count and were counted. I thank those who tirelessly carried the campaign on the social

media. At the same time, I thank our other countrymen and women who did not vote for us

but contributed to make our democratic culture truly competitive, strong and definitive.

I thank all of you.

Having just a few minutes ago sworn on the Holy Book, I intend to keep my oath and serve

as President to all Nigerians.

I belong to everybody and I belong to nobody.

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A few people have privately voiced fears that on coming back to office I shall go after them.

These fears are groundless. There will be no paying off old scores. The past is prologue.

Our neighbours in the Sub-region and our African brethren should rest assured that Nigeria

under our administration will be ready to play any leadership role that Africa expects of it.

Here I would like to thank the governments and people of Cameroon, Chad and Niger for

committing their armed forces to fight Boko Haram in Nigeria.

I also wish to assure the wider international community of our readiness to cooperate and

help to combat threats of cross-border terrorism, sea piracy, refugees and boat people,

financial crime, cyber crime, climate change, the spread of communicable diseases and other

challenges of the 21st century.

At home we face enormous challenges. Insecurity, pervasive corruption, the hitherto

unending and seemingly impossible fuel and power shortages are the immediate concerns.

We are going to tackle them head on. Nigerians will not regret that they have entrusted

national responsibility to us. We must not succumb to hopelessness and defeatism. We can

fix our problems.

In recent times Nigerian leaders appear to have misread our mission. Our founding fathers,

Mr Herbert Macauley, Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Alhaji Ahmadu Bello,

the Sardauna of Sokoto, Alhaji Abubakar Tafawa Balewa, Malam Aminu Kano, Chief J.S.

Tarka, Mr Eyo Ita, Chief Denis Osadebey, Chief Ladoke Akintola and their colleagues

worked to establish certain standards of governance. They might have differed in their

methods or tactics or details, but they were united in establishing a viable and progressive

country. Some of their successors behaved like spoilt children breaking everything and

bringing disorder to the house.

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Furthermore, we as Nigerians must remind ourselves that we are heirs to great civilizations:

Shehu Othman Dan fodio’s caliphate, the Kanem Borno Empire, the Oyo Empire, the Benin

Empire and King Jaja’s formidable domain. The blood of those great ancestors flow in our

veins. What is now required is to build on these legacies, to modernize and uplift Nigeria.

Daunting as the task may be it is by no means insurmountable. There is now a national

consensus that our chosen route to national development is democracy. To achieve our

objectives we must consciously work the democratic system. The Federal Executive under

my watch will not seek to encroach on the duties and functions of the Legislative and Judicial

arms of government. The law enforcing authorities will be charged to operate within the

Constitution. We shall rebuild and reform the public service to become more effective and

more serviceable. We shall charge them to apply themselves with integrity to stabilize the

system.

For their part the legislative arm must keep to their brief of making laws, carrying out over-

sight functions and doing so expeditiously. The judicial system needs reform to cleanse itself

from its immediate past. The country now expects the judiciary to act with dispatch on all

cases especially on corruption, serious financial crimes or abuse of office. It is only when the

three arms act constitutionally that government will be enabled to serve the country optimally

and avoid the confusion all too often bedeviling governance today.

Elsewhere relations between Abuja and the States have to be clarified if we are to serve the

country better. Constitutionally there are limits to powers of each of the three tiers of

government but that should not mean the Federal Government should fold its arms and close

its eyes to what is going on in the states and local governments. Not least the operations of

the Local Government Joint Account. While the Federal Government cannot interfere in the

details of its operations it will ensure that the gross corruption at the local level is checked.

As far as the constitution allows me I will try to ensure that there is responsible and

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accountable governance at all levels of government in the country. For I will not have kept

my own trust with the Nigerian people if I allow others abuse theirs under my watch.

However, no matter how well organized the governments of the federation are they can not

succeed without the support, understanding and cooperation of labour unions, organized

private sector, the press and civil society organizations. I appeal to employers and workers

alike to unite in raising productivity so that everybody will have the opportunity to share in

increased prosperity. The Nigerian press is the most vibrant in Africa. My appeal to the

media today – and this includes the social media – is to exercise its considerable powers with

responsibility and patriotism.

My appeal for unity is predicated on the seriousness of the legacy we are getting into. With

depleted foreign reserves, falling oil prices, leakages and debts the Nigerian economy is in

deep trouble and will require careful management to bring it round and to tackle the

immediate challenges confronting us, namely; Boko Haram, the Niger Delta situation, the

power shortages and unemployment especially among young people. For the longer term we

have to improve the standards of our education. We have to look at the whole field of

medicare. We have to upgrade our dilapidated physical infrastructure.

The most immediate is Boko Haram’s insurgency. Progress has been made in recent weeks

by our security forces but victory cannot be achieved by basing the Command and Control

Centre in Abuja. The command centre will be relocated to Maiduguri and remain until Boko

Haram is completely subdued. But we cannot claim to have defeated Boko Haram without

rescuing the Chibok girls and all other innocent persons held hostage by insurgents.

This government will do all it can to rescue them alive. Boko Haram is a typical example of

small fires causing large fires. An eccentric and unorthodox preacher with a tiny following

was given posthumous fame and following by his extra judicial murder at the hands of the

police. Since then through official bungling, negligence, complacency or collusion Boko

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Haram became a terrifying force taking tens of thousands of lives and capturing several

towns and villages covering swathes of Nigerian sovereign territory.

Boko Haram is a mindless, godless group who are as far away from Islam as one can think of.

At the end of the hostilities when the group is subdued the Government intends to

commission a sociological study to determine its origins, remote and immediate causes of the

movement, its sponsors, the international connexions to ensure that measures are taken to

prevent a reccurrence of this evil. For now the Armed Forces will be fully charged with

prosecuting the fight against Boko haram. We shall overhaul the rules of engagement to

avoid human rights violations in operations. We shall improve operational and legal

mechanisms so that disciplinary steps are taken against proven human right violations by the

Armed Forces.

Boko Haram is not only the security issue bedeviling our country. The spate of kidnappings,

armed robberies, herdsmen/farmers clashes, cattle rustlings all help to add to the general air

of insecurity in our land. We are going to erect and maintain an efficient, disciplined people –

friendly and well – compensated security forces within an over – all security architecture.

The amnesty programme in the Niger Delta is due to end in December, but the Government

intends to invest heavily in the projects, and programmes currently in place. I call on the

leadership and people in these areas to cooperate with the State and Federal Government in

the rehabilitation programmes which will be streamlined and made more effective. As ever, I

am ready to listen to grievances of my fellow Nigerians. I extend my hand of fellowship to

them so that we can bring peace and build prosperity for our people.

No single cause can be identified to explain Nigerian’s poor economic performance over the

years than the power situation. It is a national shame that an economy of 180 million

generates only 4,000MW, and distributes even less. Continuous tinkering with the structures

of power supply and distribution and close on $20b expanded since 1999 have only brought

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darkness, frustration, misery, and resignation among Nigerians. We will not allow this to go

on. Careful studies are under way during this transition to identify the quickest, safest and

most cost-effective way to bring light and relief to Nigerians.

Unemployment, notably youth un-employment features strongly in our Party’s Manifesto.

We intend to attack the problem frontally through revival of agriculture, solid minerals

mining as well as credits to small and medium size businesses to kick – start these

enterprises. We shall quickly examine the best way to revive major industries and accelerate

the revival and development of our railways, roads and general infrastructure.

Your Excellencies, My fellow Nigerians I cannot recall when Nigeria enjoyed so much

goodwill abroad as now. The messages I received from East and West, from powerful and

small countries are indicative of international expectations on us. At home the newly elected

government is basking in a reservoir of goodwill and high expectations. Nigeria therefore has

a window of opportunity to fulfil our long – standing potential of pulling ourselves together

and realizing our mission as a great nation.

Our situation somehow reminds one of a passage in Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar

There is a tide in the affairs of men which,

taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;

Omitted, all the voyage of their life,

Is bound in shallows and miseries.

We have an opportunity. Let us take it.

Thank you

Muhammadu Buhari

President Federal Republic of NIGERIA and

Commander in-chief-of the Armed forces

faculty of art - university of nigeria

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