Ideological Discursive Strategies in the 2023 Nigerian Presidential Election: A Critical Discourse Analysis of Categorisation on Twitter (X)

This paper investigates how categorisation functions as an ideological discursive strategy in Twitter (X) discourse surrounding the 2023 Nigerian presidential election. Categorisation, understood here as the linguistic labelling of individuals and groups according to social identities such as ethnicity, region, and religion, is analysed as a key resource through which political actors and ordinary citizens construct legitimacy and delegitimacy online. Drawing on Fairclough's socio-cultural model and van Dijk's socio-cognitive framework, the study examines ten purposively selected tweets, drawn to reflect a range of ethnic, regional, and partisan viewpoints rather than a single narrative, to show how ethnic, geopolitical, and religious identities were constructed and mobilised during online political debate. The findings show that Twitter users repeatedly used categorisation to draw ingroup-outgroup boundaries, invoke stereotypes, legitimise preferred candidates, and delegitimise opponents, using identity markers such as Yoruba, Igbo, Fulani, Obidient, and the Muslim-Muslim ticket to stake out positions on legitimacy, power, fairness, and national unity. Rather than treating these claims as settled fact, the analysis treats them as perceptions and rhetorical positions being contested online, and reads them against each other to show how competing groups mobilise similar discursive strategies for different ends. The study contributes a micro-linguistic account of ideological representation to research on Nigeria's digital political sphere, and argues that understanding contemporary Nigerian political communication requires attention to the cognitive, cultural, and linguistic processes through which citizens construct and contest political meaning online.