Vol. 15, No. 1, June - December 2023

This paper is a critical analysis of President Muhammadu's COVID-19 Speech in Nigeria it is an attempt to explore the various discursive practices embodied in the speech, and analyze the power dynamic at play between the president and th his audience. The speech was delivered shortly after the confirmation of Nigeria's first case on the 27 February, 2020. The researcher selected a speech as the source of data for the study. A two-level analysis was integrated in examining the critical discourse. The speech was critically analysed using the adapted Norman Furlough's three-dimensional Analytical Models. Following the models, the speech was subjected to description (text), interpretation (processing) and explanation (social practice) analyses. At the second level, in order to determine how President Muhammadu Buhari's frames the core issues in the speech, two strategies of political discourse were employed. These strategies were creativity and Metaphor. The study finds out that President Muhammadu Buhari's uses these strategies competently in terms of employing them to deliver his messages. He also uses the creative expressions to show the reality as it is, such as the current state of affair and the measures taken to contain the potential challenges of COVID19 in Nigeria. The language of power is evident in the speech, as evidenced by the president assuming the role of a paternal figure in the discourse. Overall, the president's speech is largely characterized by an authoritative, top-down approach, with the president privileging his own voice over that of his audience. Hence this study presents President Muhammadu Buhari's use of power and language in his speech, and provides insights into the communicative behavior of the Nigerian president in time of crisis.

Keywords: discourse, critical discourse analysis, metaphor, creativity, speech, strategies