Applied Linguistics Contributions to Fraud Prevention Communication at the EFCC: A Professional Programme Design

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission's public communication mandate includes producing fraud prevention messages that reach diverse Nigerian audiences across literacy levels, language backgrounds, and social contexts, yet the linguistic design of EFCC public communication materials has not previously been evaluated from a professional applied linguistics standpoint. This study applies professional applied linguistics methods to evaluate and improve fraud prevention communication at the EFCC, focusing on public awareness campaigns, whistle-blower communication protocols, and victim support communication. A professional communication review was conducted through content analysis of forty EFCC public communication products produced between 2021 and 2024, including social media posts, television public service announcements, print campaigns, and website content, supplemented by interviews with twelve EFCC communication officers and reception surveys administered to three hundred members of the public across Lagos, Abuja, and Kano. Communication review findings identify significant variation in language accessibility across products, with social media content generally more accessible than printed legal-register materials. Audience reception surveys show low comprehension of whistle-blower protocol information among respondents with less than secondary school education, while victim support communication is rated as insufficiently empathetic in emotional register by fraud victim respondents. The study designs a professional fraud prevention communication improvement programme specifying plain language guidelines, a multilingual communication protocol, and empathy-centred language standards for victim-facing communication. Keywords: fraud prevention communication, EFCC, plain language, public communication, Nigeria.