| Abstract: |
The terrain of politics is one in which politicians regularly use spin doctoring while making speeches or while granting press interviews. The outcomes of their spin doctoring are sometimes favourable but some other times counterproductive. It is this bipolarity in the likelihood of outcomes that the paper dwells on. Contextualizing the study on Nyesom Wike’s rhetoric, the work selected five extemporaneous speeches of the politician, using a survey methodology to test the speeches on a sample audience of 400. From the responses, it was found that the politician’s spin doctoring in two of the speeches produced a favourable effect but backfired on him in two other speeches. In the two cases where the outcomes were counterproductive, the politician’s rhetoric was identified to have fallen short of êthos. Hence, to ensure that spin doctoring produces favourable outcomes every time, the recommendation proffered was that politicians, particularly by proxy of their media consultants and professional communications staff, should check with their audiences from time to time to ascertain whether their audiences still find them believable or whether they still enjoy the goodwill of their audiences, then, where necessary, make amends in their character, in their conduct, or in their relations with their audiences to assure credibility and authenticity every time they communicate with their audiences. |
