It is very common in Nigeria for speakers of English language to want to sound British, even when they have not stepped out of their village. It gets worse when some even travel to Dubai for a day or two and return to the country to start faking American or British accents.
Nowadays on radio, On-Air-Personalities (OAP) try to sound American all in the name of broadcasting, which irritate some of their listeners.
One person that has expressed sadness over this is a presenter with Abuja station of Wazobia FM, Grace Ekpo. The OAP told Encomium Magazine in an interview that faking of accents by OAP is one of the major problems in the industry.
She advised her colleagues to emphasise more on passing their messages in simple sentences rather than trying to sound foreign, where they end up not passing information across to their listeners.
Grace explained that the English language belongs to the British and that there is no way Nigerians can speak the language better than the original owners. “We should stop faking accents and be real. Sometimes we fake this accent so much that people don’t understand us,” Grace pointed out.
Citing an experience with American gospel singer, Donnie McClurkin, the talented presenter disclosed that she conducted the interview with the artiste in pidgin English, which he enjoyed.
According to her, “Let me give you an instance, when I hosted the American gospel singer, Donnie McClurkin, I asked him all the questions in pidgin. He had to listen closely to understand what I was saying, then responded in English.”
“It was challenging for him, but he enjoyed it! He even said it was one of his most exciting experiences on radio. He then went on to our sister station who use English, and he asked them why don’t they use the same language that I used. Not because he was faulting their English, but because that is our thing,” she said.
