328 Copyright © 2016, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited. Chapter 18 DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-0081-0.ch018 ABSTRACT The recent events in the Nigerian political space are clear indications of a match towards the ‘unwanted’. These political events, such as the 2011 presidential elections resulted into the most violent post-elections killings in the history of Nigeria. In the light of this, media representation of that election may not be a value-free exercise but one imbued with value judgments or opinions which conveyed certain ideological leanings. It is against this background that the author examines the macrospeech acts which characterize the discourse of the 2011 post-presidential election news reports with a view to identifying and inter- preting the prominent acts and their ideological imports. The study is situated within the broad frame of pragmatics and operationalises Searle Speech Act model in order to uncover the macrospeech acts in the news reports and how the acts covertly convey instances of prejudice and control. INTRODUCTION Democracy as a system of governance, for the second time after a protracted military rule, found its return into Nigerian political space in 1999. The return ushered in the Fourth Republic of democratic dispensation and Nigerians heaved a sigh of relief. Among the institutions that were in the fore front of the struggle and clamour for a democratic rule in the country was the media. That necessitated their active involvements and other political and social institutions in contributing to the sustenance of democracy On The Threshold of Democratic Fragility: A Macrospeech Act Explication of Media Representation of the Nigerian 2011 Post-Presidential Election News Reports Asiru Hameed Tunde Umaru Musa Yar’adua University, Nigeria Daniel Ochieng Orwenjo Technical University, Kenya