‘Occupy Nigeria 2012’: A Critical Analysis of Facebook Posts in the Fuel Subsidy Removal Protests
Abstract This study critically examines the discourse of posts on Facebook in the ‘occupy Nigeria’ fuel subsidy removal protests. The Facebook posts are viewed as protest discourse with its ideological imprints of positive ‘we’ in-group representations and negative ‘other’ out-group constructions. With a CDA analytical approach, the study shows that Facebook posts are effectively used to describe the identity of the actors, articulate their arguments and demands, enunciate their activities and goals as well as provide information updates to the protesters. The protesters apply linguistic strategies such as code-switching between English and the local languages (e.g. Yoruba) and the use of Standard Nigerian English and the local pidgin to express solidarity as well as for social interaction. Interestingly, Facebook messages were posted from within Nigeria and also from other countries of the Nigerian diaspora. However despite the seeming effectiveness of the online protests via Facebook, the Nigerian protesters did not ultimately achieve their aim partly because the protests did not attract sufficient participation. The individuals engaged in the protests were divided and many still pledged their loyalty to political in-group and ethnic interest rather than national interest.
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CHILUWA, I. 2010. ‘Nigerian English in Informal Email Messages.’ English World-Wide, Vol. 31(1), 40-61.
CHILUWA, I., 2011a. Labeling and ideology in the press: a corpus-based critical discourse study of Niger Delta Crisis. Frankfurt: Peter Lang.
CHILUWA, I., 2011b. «On political participation: discursive pragmatics and social interaction in nolitics». Studies in Literature and Language 2, 2, 80-92.
CHILUWA, I., 2012a. «Citizenship, participation and CMD: the case of Nigeria». Pragmatics and Society 3, 1, 61-88.
CHILUWA, I., 2012b. «Social media networks and the discourse of resistance: a sociolinguistic CDA of Biafra online discourses». Discourse and Society 23, 3, 217-244.
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DELUCA, Kevin; Lawson, Sean & Sun, Ye, 2012. «Occupy Wall Street on the Public Screen of Social Media: the Many Framings of the Birth of a Protest Movement». Communication, Culture & Critique 5, 483-509.
FAIRCLOUGH, Norman, 2009. «A dialectical-relational approach to critical discourse analysis insocial research». In: Wodak, Ruth., Meyer, M. (Eds), Methods of Critical Analysis, 2nd ed. London: Sage, 162-186.
GAFFNEY, D., 2010. «#iranElection: quantifying online activism». Paper presented at The Web Science Conference 2010. April 26-27, Raleigh, NC, USA.
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PICKERILL, J. & KRINSKY, J. 2012. «Why Does Occupy Matter?» Social Movement Studies: Journal of Social, Cultural and Political Protest, 11: 3-4, 279-287.
PM News (2010, July 29), Nigerian senators earn 10 times more than their US counterparts, Prof. Itse Sagay.
PUTNAM, L., GRANT D., MICHELSON, G. & CUTCHER, L. 2005. «Discourse and resistance: targets, practices and consequences». Management Communication Quarterly 19, 1, 5-18.
RADDATZ, M., 2011. «Social media fuels protests in Iran, Bahrain and Yemen». www.abcnews.go.com/international/social-meida-fuels-protests-iran-bahrain. Retrieved, June 10, 2011.
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VAN DIJK, T., 2001. «Critical discourse analysis». In: Tannen, D., Schiffrin, D., Hamilton, H., (Eds.), Handbook of Discourse Analysis. Oxford: Blackwell, 352-357.
VAN DIJK, T., 2005. Politics, ideology and discourse. Elsevier Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics. Volume on Politics and Language. (Ruth Wodak, Ed), 728-740.
VEGH, S., 2003. «Classifying forms of online activism: the case of cyberprotests against the World Bank». In: MacCaughey, M., Ayers, M. (Eds), Cyberactivism: Online Activism in Theory and Practice, New York: Routledge. 71-95.
UWALAKA, J. 2003. «The Struggles for an Inclusive Nigeria: Igbos to be or not to be». Enugu, SNAAP Press.
AHRENS, F., 2001. For activists today: it’s Marks, not Marx. The Washington Post. 20 April.
AKANDE, L., 2011. «Presidency in dollar salary controversy for US based ministers», http://www.nigeriavillagesquare.com/laolu-akande/presidency-in-dollar-salary-controversy- for-us-based-ministers.html. Retrieved, June 30, 2012.
ALABI, O., 2012. «Removal of fuel subsidy and matters arising. Nigerian Tribune», http://tribune.com.ng. Retrieved, January 15, 2012.
ASOTO, A., (2011). Top 20 most visited sites in Nigeria, http://asotoadeola.com/2011/01/top-20-most-visited-sites-in-nogeria/. Retrieved, January 15, 2012.
BROWN, A. D., 2000. «Making sense of inquiry sense-making». Journal of Management Studies, 37, 45-75.
CHIEJINA, A., 2012. «Fuel subsidy removal: repositioning Nigeria’s economy», http://www.businessdayonline.com/NG/index.php/analysis/features/31698-fuel-subsidy- removal-repositioning-nigerias-economy. Retrieved, June 30, 2012.
CHILUWA, I. 2008. ‘Assessing the Nigerianness of SMS Text-Messages in English.’ English Today 93, Vol. 24(1), 51-56.
CHILUWA, I. 2010. ‘Nigerian English in Informal Email Messages.’ English World-Wide, Vol. 31(1), 40-61.
CHILUWA, I., 2011a. Labeling and ideology in the press: a corpus-based critical discourse study of Niger Delta Crisis. Frankfurt: Peter Lang.
CHILUWA, I., 2011b. «On political participation: discursive pragmatics and social interaction in nolitics». Studies in Literature and Language 2, 2, 80-92.
CHILUWA, I., 2012a. «Citizenship, participation and CMD: the case of Nigeria». Pragmatics and Society 3, 1, 61-88.
CHILUWA, I., 2012b. «Social media networks and the discourse of resistance: a sociolinguistic CDA of Biafra online discourses». Discourse and Society 23, 3, 217-244.
CLEVELAND, M., 2010. «The potential for social media marketing in Nigeria», http://evolutionafrica.com/the-potential-for-social-mediamarketing-in-nigeria/ Retrieved, February 15, 2012.
DELUCA, Kevin; Lawson, Sean & Sun, Ye, 2012. «Occupy Wall Street on the Public Screen of Social Media: the Many Framings of the Birth of a Protest Movement». Communication, Culture & Critique 5, 483-509.
FAIRCLOUGH, Norman, 2009. «A dialectical-relational approach to critical discourse analysis insocial research». In: Wodak, Ruth., Meyer, M. (Eds), Methods of Critical Analysis, 2nd ed. London: Sage, 162-186.
GAFFNEY, D., 2010. «#iranElection: quantifying online activism». Paper presented at The Web Science Conference 2010. April 26-27, Raleigh, NC, USA.
GAL-EZER, M., Rinnawi, K., 2012. «Conflict and coexistence: conversations, demonstrations and communications in the MENA». Language and Intercultural Communication 12, 2, 97-102.
GARRETT, R.K., 2006. «Protests in an information society: a review of literature on social movements and new ICTS», Information, Communication and Society 9, 2, 202-224
GRANT, G., 2009. «Militancy and corruption in the Niger Delta: prospects for a lasting peace. The Henry Jack Society». http://www.henryjacksonsociety.org/stories.asp?id=1312.
GURAK, L. J., LOGIE, J., 2003. «Internet protests from text to web». In: MacCaughey, M., Ayers, M. (Eds), Cyberactivism: Online Activism in Theory and Practice. New York: Routledge. 25-46.
HEYD, T. (2014) ‘Doing race and ethnicity in a digital community: Lexical labels and narratives of belonging in a Nigerian web forum.’ Discourse, Context & Media, 4-5, 38-47.
HEYD, T. & MAIR, C. (forthcoming) ‘From Vernacular to Digital Ethnolinguistic Repertoire: The Case of Nigerian Pidgin.’ To appear in Lacoste, V., Leimgruber, J., Breyer, T., (Eds.). Indexing Authenticity: Perspectives from Linguistics and Anthropology. Berlin: de Gruyter.
IDLE, N., NUNNS, A., (Eds.) 2011. Tweets from Tahrir: Egypt’s revolution as it unfolded in the words of the people who made it. New York: Or Books.
IBANGA, I., 2005. «The economics of privatizing and deregulating the Nigerian downstream oil sector», www.florng.com/valore/ifiokibanga.htm/. Retrieved, January 22, 2012.
IFUKOR, P., 2010. «Elections or selections? Blogging and twittering the Nigerian 2007 general elections». Bulletin of Science, Technology & Society, 30, 6, 398-414.
JOWITT, David. 1991. Nigerian English Usage: an Introduction. Ikeja: Longman Nigeria.
MEY, J., 2001. Pragmatics: An Introduction. Oxford: Blackwell.
NKOLIKA, N. 2007. «Citizenship and ethnic militia politics in Nigeria, marginalization or identity question? The case of MASSOB». Paper presented at the 3rd Global Conference on Pluralism, Inclusion and Citizenship, Salzburg, Austria, 18-19 November.
OFULUE, C., 2004. «Creolization in Nigerian Pidgin: A Sociocultural Perspective». In: Awonusi V., Babalola E.A. (Eds), The Domestication of English in Nigeria. Lagos: University Of Lagos Press. 265-279.
OGWUONUONU, F.E., 2011. «Fuel subsidy removal, a call for national protests: Goodluck Jonathan beware!». National Network Newspaper, Vol. 8 (41) October 12th -18th http:// nationalnetworkonline.com. Retrieved, January 26, 2012.
OKORO, O. 1986. Standard Nigerian English vs. Errors: Where to draw the Line?». LARES Vol. VIII, 94-106.
PICKERILL, J. & KRINSKY, J. 2012. «Why Does Occupy Matter?» Social Movement Studies: Journal of Social, Cultural and Political Protest, 11: 3-4, 279-287.
PM News (2010, July 29), Nigerian senators earn 10 times more than their US counterparts, Prof. Itse Sagay.
PUTNAM, L., GRANT D., MICHELSON, G. & CUTCHER, L. 2005. «Discourse and resistance: targets, practices and consequences». Management Communication Quarterly 19, 1, 5-18.
RADDATZ, M., 2011. «Social media fuels protests in Iran, Bahrain and Yemen». www.abcnews.go.com/international/social-meida-fuels-protests-iran-bahrain. Retrieved, June 10, 2011.
SALTER, L., 2003. «Democracy, new social movements, and the internet: a Habermasian analysis». In: MacCaughey, M., Ayers, M. (Eds), Cyberactivism: Online Activism in Theory and Practice, New York: Routledge. 117-144.
SMITH, B., BRECHER, J., 2010. «Is social networking useless for social change?». www.commondreams.org/view/2010/10/08-3. Retrieved, June 10, 2011.
TAO, M., 2011. «Letter: Social media has fueled North African revolution». http://www.kansan.com/news/2011/feb702/letter-social-media-has-fueled-north. Retrieved June 12, 2011.
THE Mace News (Online): «National Assembly, Nigeria», http://mancenewsonline.ng. Retrieved, January 18, 2012 from.
VAN Dijk, T., 1995. «Ideological discourse analysis». In: Ventola, E., Solin, A., (Eds), Special Issue of Interdisciplinary Approaches to Discourse Analysis. New Courant (English Dept, University of Helsinki), 4, 135-161.
VAN DIJK, T., 2001. «Critical discourse analysis». In: Tannen, D., Schiffrin, D., Hamilton, H., (Eds.), Handbook of Discourse Analysis. Oxford: Blackwell, 352-357.
VAN DIJK, T., 2005. Politics, ideology and discourse. Elsevier Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics. Volume on Politics and Language. (Ruth Wodak, Ed), 728-740.
VEGH, S., 2003. «Classifying forms of online activism: the case of cyberprotests against the World Bank». In: MacCaughey, M., Ayers, M. (Eds), Cyberactivism: Online Activism in Theory and Practice, New York: Routledge. 71-95.
UWALAKA, J. 2003. «The Struggles for an Inclusive Nigeria: Igbos to be or not to be». Enugu, SNAAP Press.
Chiluwa, I. (2015). ‘Occupy Nigeria 2012’: A Critical Analysis of Facebook Posts in the Fuel Subsidy Removal Protests. CLINA Revista Interdisciplinaria De Traducción Interpretación Y Comunicación Intercultural, 1(1), 47–69. Retrieved from https://revistas.usal.es/dos/index.php/clina/article/view/12897
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