Nigerian Newspaper Coverage of Climate Change, 2009-2010

Abstract

This paper assessed the reportage of climate change in selected Nigerian newspapers, namely The Guardian, Daily Sun, ThisDay, and Vanguard. This work was done to situate Nigerian newspaper reportage of climate change within the domain of global discourses on climate change. Results indicated that the newspapers gave significant attention to issues on climate change. News stories constituted 55% of stories analysed; non news, 45%. The newspapers portrayed climate change as human-induced. Thus, stories fuelling uncertainty about climate change were not visible in the newspapers. The newspapers portrayed the Nigerian public as believing in the truth of climate change but inaccurately linked it to changes in weather patterns. Nigeria was reported as dependent on foreign aid to fight climate change. This study recommended that Nigerian newspapers should use lots of non-news stories in reporting climate change to enable them handle more analysis needed to portray the important issues in climate change solutions.

Key words: Climate change, climate scepticism, emission cuts, anti-emission solutions, pro-emission solutions, portrayals, framing, climate talks