Describing itself as a general newspaper and miscellany of interesting literature, pledged to expose all political and social evils whilst steering clear of all factional influence, The Citizen published editorials, colonial news, provincial news, news from abroad, police court reports, theatre and literature reviews, select and original literature. An introductory address in the first issue outlines the newspaper's objectives: 'We aim at the moral and social improvement of our fellow-citizens of the humbler classes, by means of an extended diffusion of instructive and entertaining KNOWLEDGE, through the medium of our unpretending Publication, whereby they must advance in the scale of respectibility and utility, as well to themselves and families, as to the community at large.'
