Tag: Abuja

More than a year ago, some 50 young people undertook the arduous journey from the town of Chibok in the north-eastern state of Borno to seek sanctuary in the capital city Lagos.

Local parents, appalled by the April 2014 kidnapping of nearly 300 female students by the jihadist group Boko Haram, had sent their own children to stay with friends or relatives until peace returned.

Conditions were tough on the three-day bus journey with little food and water. Now, although the young people are safe from the insurgency ravaging the north-east of their country, their lives in the vast city of Lagos are far from easy.

More than two million people have been internally displaced in Nigeria. The majority have found refuge among host communities, while some live in camps with support from the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA). They must depend on aid from NGOs, religious bodies and the charity of individuals.

A lack of government oversight means that fundraising is vulnerable to corruption, and some IDP leaders complained bitterly of NGOs that collected money but failed to implement any projects.

In particular, there is little help available for children separated from their parents, leaving them vulnerable to exploitation and abuse. The plight of the children from Chibok reflects the wider experience of many thousands of young IDPs in Nigeria who face an uncertain future after fleeing violence in the north-east of the country.

Most of the children from Chibok headed for the Lagos neighbourhood of Eleko, where some of them now spend their days wandering the unpaved roads, sharing cramped accommodation at night and coping with an irregular supply of water and power.  Many others have been forced to abandon their family friends and relatives to seek work within the city.

Daniel Musa, 15, said that for many months after arriving in Lagos he had been forced to sleep on a bench each night, as his guardian shared a room with eight other people.

Only recently had an arrangement been made for him to pass the night in another building, returning to his relative’s place in the morning to wash and dress.

“I have been here for more than a year with no school or permanent job,” he said. “I just sit around doing nothing most of the time.  Sometimes I work digging sand for some construction sites where I get N50 to N100 [for food], ” he said.

Daniel said he had done his best to blot out the full horror that the insurgency has caused him and his family, but described the attack that sealed his parents’ resolve to take him and his siblings out of danger.

“One day, Boko Haram attacked us around one in the morning. We packed hurriedly and hid ourselves in the bush. All our food and drink was finished.  I escaped to another village wearing just a vest and shorts. From there I got a pair of slippers, a shirt and trousers which I wore to travel down to Lagos,” he recalled.

Daniel was forced to stop studying in year six as local schools had closed in the face of constant Boko Haram attacks. Asked about his future aspirations, Daniel said he would like to continue his studies.

“I would like to work in computers,” he said. “The only help I need is for someone to send me back to school.”

Lacking education, some of the Chibok youngsters in Lagos work washing dishes for food sellers, barely making enough to survive.

About 25 per cent of Nigerian children are in employment, according to the International Labour Oganisation, and the figure amongst IDPs is much higher.

Many young women have been forced to make marriages of economic convenience. Others have found work as maids in the city, while the boys loiter around the streets, waiting for the opportunity to get work as an okada, or motorcycle taxi driver. Even then, unregistered, they risk having their bikes seized by police.

The lucky few who manage to continue studying attend a ramshackle school run by some neigbourhood women whose only qualification is a high school diploma.

The neigbourhood’s government-run community school refused to admit the displaced children, citing over-subscription and their inability to waive fees as the reasons.

Ruth Haruna, 12 and Godia Peters, were both sent to live with relatives in Lagos after girls were abducted in Chibok in April 2014.

The girls attend lessons at the school for IDPs and say they are happy. But they would dearly like to return home to their parents in Chibok, and are clearly traumatised by their experiences.

“I came here because of Boko Haram; they were killing people, burning houses and took some of our sisters away.  We miss our properties; my daddy’s car was taken away,” said Ruth, who says she would like to become a doctor.

Ibrahim Musa, another 18 year-old from Chibok, was also sent away to avoid being either killed or recruited into the ranks of the Boko Haram fighters.

“Our parents sent us here because we are still young and once Boko Haram see us, they would kidnap us and train us to start killing people. They kidnap girls too; one of my neighbour’s daughters was abducted at school.”

Mello Kolo is the chairman of the Hausa community, the ethnic group centred in northern Nigeria, in the Eleko neighbourhood. He said the young people from Chibok faced great hardship, and most of the group had been forced to leave their guardians and seek opportunities inside the city.

“More than 30 of these children have gone inside Lagos to look for work. They need help desperately and time is against them. We have been left here on our own with no help from government or any other organization. It is only the Chibok youth association who come here to check on us once in a while. ”

 

This is the concluding  part of a two-part  series of report supported with funds from the Institute for War and Peace Reporting, Abuja through the ACCESS Nigeria project.