It’s early August, a little after the Isha’i (Muslim night) prayer. Aisha Muhammad watched the clouds gather with anxiety. She knew from experience that she had little time before the rainwater would find its way through the leaks on the wall and the roofing. Once before, she had to sleep on a waterlogged mattress, leaving her frail body shivering in the morning. 

Aisha has been sick for nearly eight months. In late December last year, a motorbike had hit her along Bello Way, where she had gone to beg for alms. The biker fled the scene, leaving the old woman gnashing her teeth in pain. She barely stood until some worried onlookers helped her to a nearby medicine store and then escorted her back to the displacement camp. A few days later, she was well and continued her daily routine, although limping.

“But then she woke up one morning and couldn’t stand up,” her son, Buhari, said, holding her hands tightly. They were displaced from their homes by insurgents in northeastern Nigeria, fleeing from one village to another until they got to Sokoto in the North West six years ago. They now live in a cramped makeshift tent, barely larger than a four-by-four room, at an informal camp just outside the Kasuwar Daji area of Sokoto.

This is one of the most difficult periods they have experienced since their displacement, as Aisha’s health deteriorates. She could barely form coherent words without a fit of intermittent cough punctuating her thoughts. Laying on a threadbare bed, her laboured breath filled the tiny space as flickers of light shone through the little cracks in the wall and fell on her face. Buhari tried to find a position that would ease her discomfort before covering her legs with a thin blanket hung in one corner of the room.

Their poor living conditions and the rainy season have made matters worse for the family.

“Our roof is leaking. We often patch it with plastics and other materials because we don’t have the money to replace it. The rooms get flooded whenever it rains. We are also not protected from the cold. That’s why she’s coughing like this. The cold is too much during this period, and we have nowhere to go,” Buhari told HumAngle.

The informal camp is occupied by about 750 displaced people, including children, some of who stay in 12 damp rooms. Each one, constructed with makeshift roofing sheets, houses at least nine people. Others sleep in the open or stalls in the market where the camp is located. These days, as the rain rages heavily, unlike before, IDPs are not having it any easier. The makeshift shelters do little to protect against torrential rain or floods. Every time it rains, water seeps into their rooms, soaking their belongings, such as clothes and food items, and exposing them to cold.

The North West is home to no fewer than 600,000 displaced people in urgent need of shelter, especially during this rainy period. Some stay in public facilities like schools, abandoned buildings, and open spaces with no means to keep warm. They struggle to find food, and accessing basic healthcare seems like a pipe dream. Other basic needs for proper hygiene have also become extremely difficult to come by — a situation that has seen the region grapple with unprecedented levels of malnutrition and preventable disease outbreaks.

For over three hours on a rainy Sunday night in August, Aisha Tukur and nine others huddled in one corner of their tiny space to shield themselves from the water trickling down the roof while also trying to keep warm. By morning, her sack of clothes and other belongings, including the food she had kept to eat the following day, were drenched. She had to discard part of the food and sun-dry the little she could salvage.

It took them a whole day to clear the water from their shelter. Later that night, they still had to pass the night on the damp floor.

“Life here during the rainy season is very terrible. Whenever it rains, our homes and properties get flooded, with no place for us to sit or sleep. We would then dry our properties when the sun rises. All of our properties, including clothes and mattresses, often get soaked,” Tukur lamented. 

She told HumAngle she had to sell some of her clothes, particularly wrappers, to camp residents who wanted them to keep warm during the nights. She was able to gather enough from the sales to buy food items and keep the remaining money for emergencies. “I did not sell it intentionally; it was the situation that forced me to do that,” she explained.

Apart from the cramped living conditions, one thing was quite noticeable at the camp entrance: puddles of murky, putrid water. Towards the exit of the camp was also a small heap of refuse, a few walks from where some group of women were cooking. The head of the camp, Aisha Murtala, says many have resorted to excreting in the open because the toilets are already filled to the brim and clogged.

Experts say poor sanitary conditions, prolonged exposure to cold, and overcrowding, especially in displacement camps, are recipes for some of the world’s worst diseases. Nigeria is a hotspot for cholera, for example. Between January and mid-August 2024, it reported a total of 5,951 cases and recorded 176 deaths across 36 states.

Cholera is caused by eating food or drinking water contaminated with the bacterium Vibrio cholerae, which often finds its nest in places like overcrowded displacement camps with no safe water, blocked sewage and leaking water pipes, and indiscriminate dumping of refuse, which enables flies to carry the bacteria to water or food. 

This raises fear about the situation in the camp, where residents have continued to complain of malaria, diarrhoea, fever, and swollen body parts. At the same time, some have rashes appearing on their skins.

“Everybody is sick,” Nana Shehu, 65, quipped. Nana had just recovered from an illness that took her down for five long days. She had a headache and was running a temperature. Some days, she would also throw up the food and the medications her daughter got for her at a local medicine store.

“I think it’s because of the cold. Many days before I fell sick, I squatted and lay down in one corner on the wet ground because I had nowhere to hide and no blanket. The roof leaks, but we don’t have the money to replace it. Most of the time, when it rains, all my clothes get wet, and I have to wait until the sun comes out before I can spread them to dry again. We need help,” Nana said.