Abstract
Speech making in politics is an essential tool used to manage relationships between politicians and the electorate. The success of a speech depends on the content and the discourse and linguistic strategies employed to achieve speakers’ communicative goals. Political speeches have been widely studied, but extant studies have given tangential attention to the management of rapport in speeches of political office holders delivered in crisis situation in Nigeria. Two speeches delivered by President Muhammadu Buhari (PMB) and Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu (GBS) on the #EndSARS protests in Nigeria, downloaded from www.guardian.ng and www.premiumtimesng.com respectively, were purposively selected and analysed using Rapport Management theory. This is with the view to accounting for the linguistic elements and discourse strategies and their functions in maintaining harmonious relationship in selected texts. Linguistic elements such as the inclusive “we”, the institutional “I”, collective/possessive “us” “our” “your” and descriptive adjectives and strategies such as claiming common ground, expressing solidarity, showing empathy were employed to manage rapport and achieve communicative goals by PMB and GBS. While GBS tactically avoids utterances that are rapport threatening, some utterances of PMB have the tendency to impair rapport. He however mitigates them through hedging, personalisation, institutionalisation and testimonial argument.
Highlights
Speech making is an essential aspect of politics which involves the organisation and management of society
That the quality of a speech depends on the content, as well as the in-built strategies, and these may positively or negatively impact on the public image/perception or integrity of the speaker. It is on this backdrop that this study examines selected speeches of President Muhammadu Buhari and Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu on the #EndSARS protests in Nigeria
This paper sets out to study how language is used to maintain harmonious relationship and achieve communicative goals in political speeches delivered in crisis situation
Summary
Speech making is an essential aspect of politics which involves the organisation and management of society. An occasion for a political public speaker to deliver a speech often provides the opportunities for him/her to establish rapport and maintain social relationships with his/her listeners As a process, it involves the writer in preparing a ready-made script for oral presentations. In October 2020, following the report of many cases of corruption, harassment and human rights abuses, Nigerian youths gathered at different locations in major cities across the country to stage mass demonstrations accompanied by widespread campaign especially on the social media calling for the disbandment of SARS and a reform in the entire Police Force Not long, their demands began to draw the attention of sympathisers, especially Nigerians in diaspora, who staged solidarity protests in many city centres around the world.
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
