Bias And Ideology In Newspapers’ Reportage Of Herdsmen Related Crimes In Nigeria

Though media organisations hardly get involved in crimes directly, they have tendency to discreetly fuel criminalities through what, and how, they report. We examined how three Nigerian newspapers of different geo-political zones and socio-political ideologies reported herdsmen-related crimes between June 2020 and June 2021 in Nigeria. The aim was to determine reportorial variations and account for such variations from linguistic perspective. Thirty major violent events covered by most national newspapers within the period were sampled. Headlines and sampled parts of the reports for each newspaper were analysed using the Hallidayan transitivity and textual analytical frameworks. The results showed that while two of the newspapers consistently concur in factual presentations (about participants involved in reported crimes), one newspaper consistently departs by reversing participant roles, de-emphacising participant information, mitigating casualty figures and outright exclusionary reportage. It is concluded that the manipulative strategies by the newspaper with substantial reportorial variation may all be intentional and connected with shared ethno-tribal and ethno-religious ideology between the newspaper’s owners and the groups constantly alleged to be perpetrators of the reported crimes. This manner of filtering and distortion bias has tendency for increased animosities and crimes among the various groups involved in the reported crimes, with cumulative influence on national peace and security.