Political Opinion Leadership and Voter Choices in the 2023 General Elections in Rivers East Senatorial District, Rivers State, Nigeria

Abstract

A key aim of every electioneering campaign is to convince voters to vote for particular candidates or political parties. However, extant research has shown that several factors aside campaigns shape voter choices. In rural settings with peculiar educational and media literacy indices, voters take recourse to opinion leaders to act as guide lights to choice of candidates and parties. Against this backdrop, this study examined political opinion leadership and voter choices in Nigeria’s 2023 general elections in Rivers East Senatorial District Rivers State, Nigeria. Using correlational research design, the study analysed five research questions, using elite, issue voting, media influence, and rational choice theories as components of the theoretical framework. Using multi-stage sampling technique, the study drew a sample of 400 respondents from a population of 1,188,733 registered voters in the Senatorial District. A close-ended 30-item questionnaire with a reliability coefficient of 0.85, using Pearson Product Moment Correlation method, served as the instrument for data collection. The findings of the study indicated a significant relationship between political opinion leadership, political knowledge, political engagement, media consumption, and voter choices in the 2023 general elections in the Senatorial District. Based on these findings, the study recommends that political candidates should provide clear explanations of their policies via social, new and traditional media channels to ensure opinion leaders can access credible contents to cascade down to their followers to avoid them making voting choices on false contents they encounter in the media, or having no contents on which to base their choices. 

Received: 28 January 2025 / Accepted: 6 March 2025 / Published: 10 March 2025