Nigeria

Overview

The Boko Haram insurgency in northeastern Nigeria, surging banditry violence in the northwest, incessant farmer/herder conflict in the middle belt and a growing Cameroonian refugee population in the south have all culminated into a complex country crisis for the west African giant. Boko Haram, and its break-out faction ISWAP have continued insurgent activities for over 10 years. The Nigerian military, and the African Union Multinational Joint Task Force have had to contend with suicide bombings, military garrison attacks and arsonic raids on both soft and hard targets. The insurgency has further spread to Niger, Chad and Cameroon in the Lake Chad Basin with over 1.8m people internally displaced in Nigeria alone.?

In Nigeria's northwest, activities of bandits in Sokoto, Kaduna, Kebbi, Niger, Zamfara and Katsina states have displaced over 160,000 internally while causing about 41,000 more to flee to Maradi in neighboring Niger Republic.?Bandits engage in killings, kidnappings for ransom, cattle rustling and sexual violence in communities already at the lower ebbs of poverty and development indexes. The discovery of gold reserves in Zamfara means that apart from bandits, security forces have to also contend with activities of illegal miners and NSAGs in the northwest.

Violence between herders (also known as pastoralists) and farmers has continued for decades in Nigeria’s Middle Belt states of Taraba, Benue, Kaduna, Plateau, Nasarawa, and Adamawa. Farmer-herder clashes left more than 1,300 people dead and displaced 300,000 people across the country from January-June 2018. There is a lack of recent available data on the amount of people affected by farmer-herder violence.?

The intensification of Cameroon's Anglophone crisis has pushed more than 60,000 people across the Bakassi peninsula into Nigeria.? These refugees are hosted in Nigerian states of Akwa Ibom, Benue, Cross River and Taraba states. Many of the refugees are in need of food, WASH, health, relief and non-relief materials.

Latest Developments

11/09/2020: Rains and floods in Jigawa, Kano, Kebbi and Sokoto states have killed 45 people and damaged or destroyed thousands of homes and large areas of crops. In Jigawa, some 50,00 houses are damaged, with people seeking shelter in schools and mosques. In Kebbi, 500,000 hectares of crops are destroyed. In Sokoto, over 5,200 people are displaced. In Kano, some 5,200 houses are destroyed.?

09/09/2020: Heavy rains and strong winds between 29 August and 6 September damaged infrastructure in 12 IDP camps in Borno State (in Dikwa, Jere, Gwoza, Monguno, Maiduguri, and Konduga LGAs). Over 6,300 people have been affected, and at least 1,740 shelters and 60 toilets were damaged. Construction and sanitation materials are urgently needed.?

26/08/2020: At least 1,126 villagers were killed and 380 people abducted by groups of unidentified armed men in Nigeria's northwest between January and June 2020. The most recent attacks targeted Sutti village (Sokoto state), Dantankari, Daudawa villages, and Danmusa town (Katsina state). At least a dozen residents were kidnapped and cows and food were stolen.?

26/08/2020: Members of Boko Haram attacked the town of Magumeri, in Borno state, on 18 August. Two soldiers and one civilian were killed and the general hospital of Magumeri was burnt down.?

20/08/2020: On 13 August, the UN declared that 10.6 million people now require humanitarian assistance in Nigeria's northeast due to insecurity and COVID-19. Continued attacks by Boko Haram and ISWAP are leading to increased numbers of people in need. Attacks on villages already declared ‘safe’ by the Nigerian military are adding to the tally of people requiring humanitarian assistance. Most recently, ISWAP militants attacked Kukawa town on 18 August, where over 1,200 IDPs had just returned on 2 August, causing 10 fatalities and abducting several hundreds returnees. The recent numbers published by the UN mean that four out of every five of the 13 million people living in Borno, Adamawa and Yobe states will require assistance in 2020. This marks a 50% increase in the number of people in need of assistance since 2019.?

ACAPS' team is daily monitoring the impact of COVID-19. Find more information related to the outbreak here.