THE STRUCTURE OF CORRUPTION STORIES IN NIGERIAN NEWSPAPERS: A COUNTER FRAMING RE-IMAGINATION

Three objectives were set including the exploration of how reporters handled counter framing cues in the studied newspaper texts. Eleven texts were sampled, categorized and analyzed under three exemplars, namely: Structural Amnesia, Connivance by the International Community and Imposition of Assumptions. Unstructured chance interviews were conducted with the reporters who wrote the texts that were analyzed. Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) was used as a tool of analysis. Among other findings was that by being too alert to the tacit codes that govern journalism practice, reporters unwittingly help the powerful to avoid getting roughened up with aggressive reporting.