Nigerias

In December 2014, an incumbent president lost a re-election bid for the first time in Nigeria’s history. 

It was a time characterised by widespread anguish and anger at how insecure the Nigerian life had become. Boko Haram, the extremist insurgent group fighting to establish what it calls an Islamic State, had intensified its violence, killing hundreds of thousands, displacing millions more, and abducting hundreds of teenage girls from school. Bombs were also being detonated in major cities at an alarming rate. For Nigerians, the incumbent President Goodluck Jonathan simply had to go. And so Muhammadu  Buhari was voted in with unflinching hope that things would get better. That hope quickly turned into disillusionment and, in some cases, anger as things began to take a different turn than was hoped for.

Today, July 13, the former president, Muhammadu Buhari, passed away at 82, signalling the conclusion of a significant political chapter. As tributes from dignitaries continue to emerge and headlines reflect on his ascent and legacy, HumAngle analyses the impact of his presidency on the lives of Nigerians beyond the halls of power, in displacement camps, remote villages, and troubled areas.

An examination of the security legacy

During his time in office from 2015 to 2023, Nigeria faced increasing violence on various fronts: the Boko Haram insurgency in the North East, a resurgence of militants in the Niger Delta, and the rising threat of terrorism and conflicts between farmers and herders in the North West and Middle Belt. 

Buhari’s administration initiated multiple military operations, including Operation Lafiya Dole, Operation Python Dance, Operation Safe Corridor, etc., yielding mixed outcomes and levels of responsibility. While some campaigns succeeded in pushing back armed groups, others faced criticism due to evidence of excessive force, extrajudicial killings, and displacements within communities. Non-kinetic counter-insurgency operations such as the Operation Safe Corridor, which was launched in 2016, also came under heavy criticism. Though the programme was designed for Boko Haram members or members of similar insurgent groups in the northeastern region to safely defect from the terror groups and return to society, HumAngle found that civilians were finding their way into these programmes, due to mass arbitrary arrests prompted by profiling and unfounded allegations. The International Crisis Group also found that, beyond innocent civilians being forced to undergo the programme, other kinds of irregularities were going on. 

“The program has also been something of a catch-all for a wide range of other individuals, including minors suspected of being child soldiers, a few high-level jihadists and alleged insurgents whom the government tried and failed to prosecute and who say they have been moved into the program against their will,” the group said in a 2021 report. At the time, more than 800 people had graduated from the programme.

The programme also did not – and still does not – have space for women, and HumAngle reported the repercussions of this.

During Buhari’s reign, terrorists were also forced out of major towns but became more entrenched in rural communities. The former president launched aggressive military campaigns against them, reclaiming villages and cities. Boko Haram retreated into hard-to-reach areas with weaker government presence, operating in remote parts of Borno, Yobe, and Adamawa States. In these areas, the group imposed strict rules, conscripted fighters, and punished dissenters, often with brutal force.

A HumAngle geospatial investigation also showed how insurgency wrecked hundreds of towns and villages in Borno state. Many of the rural settlements were overrun after Boko Haram lost urban ground under Buhari’s watch.

Even with significant investment in security, a large portion of rural Nigeria remains ungoverned to date. As the former president failed to curb the forest exploits of Boko Haram, the terror group expanded control over ungoverned spaces, particularly in the North Central and North East regions. In Niger State alone, terrorists took over communities in Shiroro, Rafi, Paikoro, and Munya LGAs, uprooting thousands and launching multiple attacks. The lack of accessible roads and communication infrastructure made rapid response nearly impossible, allowing the terrorists to operate with impunity.

HumAngle found that, under Buhari, Nigeria lost many forest areas to terrorists, especially in Niger state. In areas like Galadima Kogo, terrorists imposed taxes, enforced laws, and ran parallel administrations. The withdrawal of soldiers from key bases emboldened the terrorists. This shift from urban insurgency to rural domination underscores the failure to secure Nigeria’s vast ungoverned spaces. Analysts who conducted a study on alternative sovereignties in Nigeria confirmed that Boko Haram and other non-state actors exploited the governance gaps under Buhari’s administration to expand their influence, threatening national security.

Perspectives from areas affected by conflict

For individuals beyond Abuja and Lagos, Buhari’s governance was characterised more by the state’s tangible influence than by formal policy declarations.

In Borno and Yobe, civilians faced military checkpoints and insurgent violence. School abductions like the Dapchi abduction and many others were recorded..

In Zamfara and Katsina, the president’s silence on mass abductions often resounded more than his condemnations. In Rivers and Bayelsa, the Amnesty Programme faltered, and pipeline protection frequently took precedence over human security.

What remained unaddressed

While some lauded his stance against corruption, numerous victims of violence and injustice during Buhari’s time in office did not receive restitution or formal acknowledgement of the wrongdoing. The former President remained silent during his tenure, as significant human rights violations were recorded. The investigations into military abuses, massacres, forced disappearances, and electoral violence either progressed slowly or ultimately came to an end.

Police brutality was a major problem during his tenure, leading to the EndSARS protests that swept through the entire nation in October 2020, with Lagos and Abuja being the major sites. The peaceful protests sought to demand an end to extrajudicial killings and extortion inflicted by the now-defunct Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS). For two weeks, Nigerians trooped into the streets with placards and speakers, memorialising the victims of police brutality and demanding an end to the menace. The protests came to a painful end on the night of October 20, when the Nigerian military arrived at the Lekki Toll Gate in Lagos and fired live rounds into the crowd of unarmed civilians as they sat on the floor, singing the national anthem. It is now known as the Lekki Massacre. Though the government denied that there was any violence, much less a massacre, a judicial panel of inquiry set up to investigate the incident confirmed that there had, in fact, been a massacre. 

No arrests were made, and activitsts believe some protesters arrested then may still be in detention to date.

Five years before this, on December 13 and 14, the Nigerian military opened fire on a religious procession in Zaria, containing members of the Islamic Movement of Nigeria (IMN), killing many and leaving others wounded. The incident is now known as the Zaria Massacre. HumAngle spoke to families of some of the people who were killed and children who were brutalised during this time.

Though these massacres have all been well documented, there has been little to no accountability for the aggressors or compensation for victims and their families. 

“My life became useless, losing three children and my husband to soldiers for committing no offence…I have never gone three days without my husband and all my children. This has affected my last-born, who is now in a psychiatric facility,” Sherifat Yakubu, 60, told HumAngle. 

“I feel a great wrench of sadness anytime I remember the injustice against my people, and I don’t think the authorities are ready to dispense justice,” another victim told HumAngle in 2022, highlighting the gap and lack of trust in the system created by the absence of any accountability after the incident.

Key achievements 

Beyond the headlines, Buhari played a crucial role in establishing a framework for centralised security authority. Choices regarding law enforcement, military presence, and national security circumvented local leaders and established institutions, exacerbating conflicts between the central government and regional entities. This centralisation continues to influence Nigeria’s democratic journey, disconnecting many experiences from those who are supposed to safeguard them.

Buhari rode into power on a widely hailed anti-corruption campaign, a promise honoured with the swift implementation of the already-proposed Single Treasury Account (TSA). By 2017, the programme, which consolidated up to 17,000 accounts, had saved the country up to ₦5.244 trillion. Buhari’s Presidential Initiative on Continuous Audit (PICA) eliminated over ₦54,000 ghost jobs, and Nigeria reclaimed ₦32 billion in assets in 2019. Under the same administration, Nigeria got back $300 million in Swiss-held Abacha loot. 

From 2.5 million MT in 2015, rice production rose to four million MT in 2017. In an effort to deter rice, poultry and fertiliser smuggling, the former president closed Nigeria’s land borders on August 20, 2019, a move believed to have bolstered local food production significantly. His government’s Presidential Fertiliser Initiative also produced over 60 million 50 kg bags, saving about $200 million in forex and ₦60 million yearly.

Infrastructural achievements under the late president include the completion of the Abuja-Kaduna, Itakpe-Warri and  Lagos-Ibadan railway projects, as well as the extension of the Lagos-Ibadan-Port Harcourt rail line. Notably, his government completed the Second Niger Bridge and the Lekki Deep Seaport.

Fatalities from Boko Haram reduced by 92 per cent, from 2,131 deaths in 2015 to 178 in 2021. Under the same administration, over a million Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) were resettled, and 13,000+ hostages, including some Chibok and Dapchi schoolgirls, regained freedom. The same government acquired 38 new aircraft and Nigeria’s first military satellite (Delsat-1).

In 2021, the Buhari government signed the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA), restructuring the Nigerian National Petroleum Commission (NNPC) into a commercial entity and setting the stage for significant transformation in the country’s oil and gas sector.

Confronting the past may be the path forward

The passing of a president demands more than mere remembrance or the crafting of political narratives. It should create an opportunity for national reflection. As Nigeria faces fresh challenges of insecurity, displacement, and regional strife, Buhari’s legacy presents both insights and cautions. 

As official tributes accumulate, Nigerians reflect not only on what Buhari accomplished but also on what remains incomplete.

DAKAR, Senegal — Nobel Prize-winning author Wole Soyinka said his non-resident visa to enter the United States had been rejected, adding that he believes it may be because he recently criticized President Trump.

The Nigerian author, 91, won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1986, becoming the first African to do so.

Speaking to the press on Tuesday, Soyinka said he believed it had little to do with him and was instead a product of the United States’ immigration policies. He said he was told to reapply if he wished to enter again.

“It’s not about me, I’m not really interested in going back to the United States,” he said. “But a principle is involved. Human beings deserve to be treated decently wherever they are.”

Soyinka, who has taught in the U.S. and previously held a green card, joked on Tuesday that his green card “had an accident” eight years ago and “fell between a pair of scissors.” In 2017, he destroyed his green card in protest over Trump’s first inauguration.

The letter he received informing him of his visa revocation cites “additional information became available after the visa was issued,” as the reason for its revocation, but does not describe what that information was.

Soyinka believes it may be because he recently referred to Trump as a “white version of Idi Amin,” a reference to the dictator who ruled Uganda from 1971 until 1979.

He jokingly referred to his rejection as a “love letter” and said that while he did not blame the officials, he would not be applying for another visa.

“I have no visa. I am banned, obviously, from the United States, and if you want to see me, you know where to find me.”

The U.S. Consulate in Nigeria’s commercial hub, Lagos, directed all questions to the State Department in Washington, D.C., which did not respond to immediate requests for comment.

Mcmakin writes for the Associated Press.

Nigeria’s corridors of power are again trembling under the weight of suspicion. President Bola Tinubu’s dramatic overhaul of the nation’s military command has ignited debate, fear, and whispers of betrayal within the ranks, days after reports of a foiled coup attempt surfaced.

On Oct. 24, the President dismissed General Christopher Musa, his Chief of Defence Staff, replacing him with General Olufemi Oluyede, formerly Chief of Army Staff. Major General Waidi Shaibu now heads the army, Air Vice Marshal Sunday Kelvin Aneke becomes the new Air Chief, and Rear Admiral Idi Abbas takes charge of the navy. Only Major General Emmanuel Akomaye Parker Undiandeye, Chief of Defence Intelligence, retained his seat — a notable exception in an otherwise sweeping purge.

A State House statement signed by Sunday Dare, Special Adviser on Media and Public Communication, claimed the changes were made “to strengthen Nigeria’s national security architecture.” But some Nigerians are taking the government’s explanation at face value.

The shake-up comes amid rumours of an attempted coup — reports that Tinubu’s administration has tried to downplay but cannot entirely dismiss.

Although the Defence Headquarters did not directly acknowledge any intentions of a coup, Brigadier General Tukur Gusau, a representative of the organisation, mentioned on Oct. 4 that 16 officers were being investigated for disciplinary issues and breaches of service protocols. This situation arose a year after Nigerians demanded a military intervention in response to escalating economic difficulties.

However, sources within Nigeria’s corridors of power have told HumAngle that more reshuffling will occur in the coming weeks as the Tinubu-led administration fights to maintain its grip on democratic power. The sources stated that amid ongoing investigations, the service chiefs were rejigged to fill the gaps in the military intelligence system. 

Over 20 officers are now under detention following what officials described as “disciplinary breaches”. However, insiders suggest something deeper, pointing to a widening rift inside the armed forces and a purge disguised as reform.

“All the suspects are from one region,” a source familiar with the investigation said. “If this were really a coup, how could it have succeeded? What’s happening looks more like a purge than a coup plot. Perhaps they may be clearing the path for someone not yet in the picture.”

The officer added that growing grievances among northern officers have festered for months, notably since recruitment shifted from state-based quotas to geopolitical zones. “The north, which has three regions, has now been reduced to one,” another senior officer lamented.

For many within the ranks, the move feels political. Yet the government remains tight-lipped, neither naming nor prosecuting the detained officers. And “the evidence is sketchy,” one insider admitted. “In the end, what may happen is compulsory retirement for many of them, and rarely will there ever be a treason trial.”

Nigeria has experienced this troubling pattern in its history. The country’s modern timeline is marked by a series of military interventions, beginning with the first coup in 1966 and continuing through violent takeovers in 1975, 1983, and 1985, culminating in the Abacha dictatorship that suffocated the nation during the 1990s. Each coup was accompanied by promises of reform, yet the reality was one of repression, economic decline, and bloodshed.

What makes today’s situation chillingly familiar is the regional context. Across Africa, coups are no longer distant echoes of a troubled past; they have become resurgent realities. From Mali and Burkina Faso to Niger, Gabon, and now Madagascar, nine coups have shaken the continent since 2020, eroding democratic norms and emboldening soldiers who see themselves as saviours of failed civilian governments.

In Nigeria, where frustration is soaring over economic collapse, inflation, and insecurity, the thin line between democracy and disorder is wearing dangerously thin.

For President Tinubu, the latest reshuffle is both a desperate consolidation of power and an implicit admission of fragility. Analysts warn that internal divisions within the military, especially along regional lines, could prove explosive if left unchecked.

“There’s no better time to reform the armed forces than now,” one senior intelligence officer told HumAngle. “It’s far more important than even a constitutional review. We cannot afford a significant population bearing guns to remain aggrieved.” There are so many things wrong with the security sector that we must pay attention to, said the senior intelligence officer. 

The cold bites harder at night. Nathaniel Bitrus* feels it on his face as the motorcycle roars along the dirt path to Sunawara, a small community in the Toungo area of Adamawa State, North East Nigeria. A chainsaw sits carefully on his lap, and with two other men, he disappears into the forest.

Nathaniel has spent nearly half of his 45 years taking this three-hour trip. It has helped feed his family, but it has also taken lives and stripped the forest bare. Once, he says, the forests were so dense that the sun barely touched the ground at noon. Now, there are clearings everywhere. Loggers like him have carved paths through the vast Gashaka-Gumti National Park, cutting less lucrative trees to reach the prize – rosewood.

The forest is patrolled, Nathaniel says, checkpoints mounted along the main routes. But with a government permit and the usual bribe, he says, a passage can be bought. 

The men prefer the cheaper way, the secret trails that slip past the eyes of rangers and guards, the paths only loggers know. One such road is called Yaro Me Ka Dauko, a Hausa phrase meaning, “Boy, what are you carrying?” It is the road of the daring. Nathaniel takes it again in silence tonight. He does not have a choice.

When farming is no longer enough 

Nathaniel was a farmer first, or at least he tried to be. He grew maize on a small plot outside Toungo, enough to feed his wife and children. But then the seasons turned. The rains came late or did not come at all, and so the harvests shrank.

In 2001, some men from Lagos, South West Nigeria, came asking for people who could supply rosewood. They showed pictures of the trees they wanted. The locals knew exactly where to find them. Nathaniel was in his twenties then, strong enough to swing an axe all night, and the pay was good – ₦1,000 (about $10 then) per tree log. It was enough to buy food, pay school fees, and buy fertilisers and insecticides, he recalls. 

He signed up.

Soon, there were chainsaws, trucks, and high-paying middlemen. They cut faster and worked into the nights.

David Isaac*, another Toungo farmer-turned-logger, tells us he has been at it for 15 years. “I cut trees to feed my family,” he says. “Farming does not pay anymore. This one does.”

In Baruwa, a forest community tucked in the Mambilla Plateau in the Gashaka Local Government Area of neighbouring Taraba State, George Johnson* has been logging for three decades. He first came to Gembu, a cold town on the plateau, to work on people’s farms. But farming paid too little. 

“Things were expensive,” he says. Logging was better. Sometimes he harvests eucalyptus for local farmers. Other times, when dealers call, he travels three hours to Baruwa to log rosewood.

“The work is dangerous,” Nathaniel says.

They spend days deep in the forest, cutting trees. At night, they sleep with one eye open in makeshift tents. Wild animals prowl close. 

“Sometimes people die or get injured,” says David. “Trees fall on people.”

It happened to him once. He lived. Others were not so lucky.

Rosewood is heavy. When a tree falls, the men loop chains around the trunk and drag it out of the forest until it reaches the dirt road, where trucks wait to transport the logs to a depot outside Sunawara. But as more people died, they pooled money for a crane.

“We did not choose this job,” Nathaniel says softly. “We went to school. But there is no work. If I had a choice, I would not do this.”

Road to China

The real money is not in Toungo or Gashaka or the Mambilla Plateau.

It is in the hands of dealers, foreign buyers, and complicit officials who turn forests into fortunes.

When a dealer receives a consignment request, he calls loggers like Nathaniel.

“We have dedicated loggers, the ones we contact anytime there is demand,” says Charles Ekene*, a Gembu-based dealer. The buyers rarely visit, he says. “They communicate over the phone.”

The dealer commissions the loggers, supplies chainsaws and trucks, sets the prices, pays the transporters, and handles all the paperwork.

Loggers like Nathaniel have their own tools and work independently. “We meet with loggers at a place called ‘Kan Cross, where we negotiate prices,” says  Aliyu Muhammad, a 20-year-old Toungo-based motorcyclist. A trip into the forest costs about ₦4,000 ($2.68), he explains. 

Inside the forest, the loggers cut the trees, paint their initials onto the stumps to mark ownership, and drag the trunks to the roadside. From there, trucks carry them to depots beyond Sunawara.

“They pay about ₦20,000 [$13.40] per log,” Nathaniel says. 

The logs are measured with tape, he adds. 

“And since we do not have access to the buyers in Lagos, we accept whatever the dealers pay us,” says David. 

George says he gets ₦40,000 ($26.81) no matter the size of the log. This is where the real profit begins.

“A truck could fetch ₦3 million [about $2,100] or more on a good day,” Charles says.

From Taraba and Adamawa, the trucks head southward. “From Baruwa, we drive to Jalingo,” Hamma Yusuf*, a 38-year-old truck driver, tells us. And from Jalingo, they reach Lagos, passing through Abuja. 

“It is close to the water,” he says vaguely of the final location. “There are a lot of containers there.”

Logs from Sunawara follow a similar path, passing through Yola, the Adamawa State capital, then Abuja. “Other drivers head first to Kano,” David explains. “A few take the hilly roads through Gembu before reaching Baissa in Taraba.”

Hamma has been transporting timber since 2010. It is mostly intrastate – moving logs from Baruwa and Nguroje, another logging hotspot in Taraba, to a major depot in Baissa, a town in the Kurmi Local Government Area. Occasionally, he makes the longer trip to Lagos.

Hamma works under someone else. They handle the paperwork and negotiate with the dealers, he explains. He carries the documents only to present at checkpoints. 

“Most of the money goes to the owner,” he says. 

Like with the loggers, truck owners decide the pay. Hamma says he earns what could sustain him and his family.

A 2022 Arise News investigation confirmed what Hamma and David describe: rosewood from the region pass through Shagamu, Ogun State, before reaching Apapa Port in Lagos, where cargo ships carry it to China. Our GIS analysis corroborates this route.

Between 2014 and 2017, an average of 40 shipping containers – about 5,600 logs, or 2,800 trees – left Nigeria for China every single day, according to the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA). In 2016 alone, the EIA reported, more than 1.4 million rosewood logs worth $300 million were smuggled into China, despite the species being listed under Appendix II of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), a classification requiring strict permitting and oversight.

Today, the financial losses remain unquantified. Neither the National Strategy to Combat Wildlife and Forest Crime (2022–2026) nor Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) performance reports estimate how much Nigeria loses annually to timber trafficking. 

In search of clarity, we filed Freedom of Information (FOI) requests to the Federal Ministry of Finance and the NCS, asking for revenue-loss data. Neither agency had responded at press time.

China’s official 2025 import figures are also unavailable. However, Statista reports that in 2023, China imported $17.1 billion worth of wood products, second only to the United States. Meanwhile, the Enhancing Africa’s Transnational Organised Crime (ENACT) 2017 report estimates that Africa loses about $17 billion annually to timber smuggling.

Much of this demand traces back to China’s enduring cultural fascination with rosewood, known as hongmu. Once reserved for emperors of the Ming and Qing dynasties, rosewood furniture became a coveted status symbol, admired for its deep hues, durability, and capacity for intricate carving. That appetite lives on. 

But China’s own forests could not sustain this demand. Large scale logging was banned decades ago. The hunger simply shifted elsewhere. First to Southeast Asia, and more recently to Africa, which now supplies the lion’s share. A 2022 Forest Trends report shows that by 2020, 83 per cent of China’s wood imports came from Africa, while shipments from Southeast Asia declined. CITES data adds that over 41 per cent of China’s rosewood log imports from range states – more than 2.2 million cubic meters worth about $1.037 billion – came from Africa. The scale of demand is staggering: Forest Trends noted that between 2000 and 2015, China’s rosewood imports surged by 1,250 per cent, with the value nearly doubling in a single year between 2013 and 2014, reaching $2.6 billion.

Laws exist, only on paper

Nigeria’s laws against illegal logging look formidable on paper. The Endangered Species Act (1985, revised 2016), the Nigerian Customs Act (2023) prohibiting the export of endangered timber, the pending Endangered Species Conservation and Protection Bill (2024), and multiple state laws ban or criminalise rosewood trafficking. Yet in 2022, CITES issued a rare Article XIII intervention, citing “persistent governance failures” and warning of possible trade sanctions if enforcement did not improve.

State-level bans tell the same story of power without teeth. Taraba State outlawed rosewood logging in 2023. Yet, George insists he pays ₦10,000 ($6.70) each to both local and state governments for annual permits. When asked for proof, he claimed he left the permit at home and promised to send a photo later – a promise he never kept.

Our attempts to verify his claim led nowhere. Officials at the Taraba State Ministry of Environment and Climate Change declined to comment. The ministry’s director of planning, research, and statistics, Fidelis Nashuka, told us, “We have a department of forestry which has no more details on this.”

That same year, Adamawa State governor Ahmadu Fintiri announced a tree-felling ban but framed it as a measure against burning trees “in the name of charcoal,” without naming specific species. Loggers say the ban changed nothing. 

“We obtain permits from the local government,” David says. 

A permit used to cost ₦30,000 ($20.11), he adds, but now goes for ₦50,000 ($34). Nathaniel agrees. “Officials could even issue them at ₦70,000 [$47],” he says, “because the business became competitive.”

When asked to produce these permits, none of the loggers could. They claim carrying the documents is risky, so they leave them at home unless heading deep into the forest. HumAngle wrote to the Adamawa State Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources to verify these claims. However, we got no response. 

On paper, Nigeria has the laws to end this trade. In reality, enforcement bends under corruption.

“We pay money at every security check point for us to be allowed to pass,” David claims.

The problem runs far deeper than local bribes. In 2017, the EIA revealed that Nigerian officials retrospectively issued about 4,000 CITES permits for rosewood logs seized in China, allegedly after payments of over a million dollars to senior officials, with the involvement of the Chinese consulate. Former Environment Minister Amina Mohammed reportedly signed the documents in her final days in office before becoming UN Deputy Secretary-General.

And this is not just a West African story. In 2021, a Kenyan court ordered the country’s Revenue Authority to return $13 million worth of confiscated rosewood to alleged traffickers. The timber had been seized at the Port of Mombasa while in transit from Madagascar through Zanzibar to Hong Kong

A 2022 report by the Institute for Security Studies argued that illegal African rosewood trafficking thrives on corruption, weak enforcement, and legal loopholes across Madagascar, Malawi, Tanzania, Zambia, and Kenya, with China’s demand as the engine driving it all. The report shows how high-level officials, court decisions, and lax port regulations across East and Southern Africa have turned enforcement into theatre, allowing traffickers to sidestep both domestic laws and CITES restrictions.

The Nigeria-Cameroon border tells the same story. Porous and poorly monitored, it serves as both source and smuggling corridor. Once, Nathaniel crossed the border into Cameroon. The locals there, he recalls, are not as deeply involved as those in Nigeria. The trees felled in Cameroon find their way into Nigeria, he explains.

A 2022 investigation traced the journey of logs from the forests of northern Cameroon through Taraba and Adamawa, showing how the wood, cleared to look Nigerian, made its way to export points. Forest Trends’ Illegal Deforestation and Associated Trade database confirms Nigeria’s role as both a major source and transit country.

People were caught along the way, Nathaniel says. “Our people were beaten, locked up. Some died in prison. At one point, we had to run to save our lives. Our equipment was even set on fire after clashes with security officials in Cameroon.”

There is some success. Occasionally, government officials seize illegal timber, arrest a handful of loggers and dealers, or burn trucks on the spot.

In Taraba, officials insist the 2023 logging ban is being enforced. 

“There are mobile courts, attached with a task force, that go round penalising illegal loggers,” says Fidelis. “They are stationed on major roads. Once the task force apprehends timber poachers, the mobile court immediately fines.”

Penalties, however, rarely go beyond fines. “No jail terms at the moment,” Fidelis admits. “We are still working on the law to include that. There have been arrests, almost every day. But I cannot mention the scale of these arrests, as I am not part of the team.”

Yet on our reporting trip, we saw no sign of these mobile courts or task forces. Only the usual immigration, military, and police checkpoints lined the roads.

At the federal level, the Nigeria Customs Service touts large-scale seizures across ports, border posts, and inland commands. Its 2024 performance report claims that from January to June 2024, the agency made 2,442 seizures with a Duty Paid Value of ₦25.5 billion ($17 million), 203 per cent higher than the same period in 2023.

The National Park Service (NPS) also points to progress. In an April interview with HumAngle, Surveyor-General Ibrahim Musa Goni said the NPS was working with agencies like the National Environmental Standards and Regulations Enforcement Agency, the NCS, and others to curb trafficking in wildlife species and plants.

At the end of 2023, Goni said, the NPS made 646 arrests across all national parks, with Gashaka-Gumti recording the highest number, a sign of persistent clashes between park rangers and illegal loggers, poachers, and other intruders in the reserve’s forests and buffer zones.

Regionally, Nigeria is working with the African Protected Area Directors (APAD), ECOWAS, and other regional blocs in East and Central Africa, Goni says. “We take our issues to the European Union and other regional bodies. This way, we get to reach the governments of various countries.”

Yet the logging continues.

The human and ecological toll

The scars are everywhere.

“Before, this place was covered with trees,” says Mary, a 45-year-old farmer in Sunawara, pointing to the bare stretch where stumps now stand like broken teeth. We flew a drone over the hills above Toungo. We could see the empty patches where forests once stood like walls.

Gathering firewood has become a daily struggle. “We have to walk a long distance now just to find enough for cooking,” Mary says.

But the loss is deeper than firewood.

“Rosewood belongs to the Fabaceae family,” explains Ridwan Jaafar, an ecosystem ecologist from the Mambilla Plateau and lead strategist for the Nigerian Montane Forest Project. “This group of species fixes atmospheric nitrogen and enriches the soil. When the trees are gone, that function disappears too.”

Farmers feel the loss directly. “It hardly rains anymore,” says Juris Saiwa, a 68-year-old farmer in Sunawara. “Maybe it is because of cutting down trees,” he adds, convinced that history links deforestation with drought.

Yields have shrunk. “We could cultivate even without fertiliser before,” says Jauro, the Sunawara village head. 

Mary agrees: “Now our crops do not grow well. The land does not produce the way it used to.”

Dr Hamman Kamale, a geologist at the University of Maiduguri in Borno State, confirms what the farmers sense. “Deforestation degrades soil fertility. Organic matter declines, soils compact, and land degradation spreads,” he says. HumAngle reported in July that farmers in Taraba complained of dry spells withering their crops.

The damage spirals outward. Ridwan explains that trees play a key role in carbon storage. “Forests act as terrestrial carbon sinks, absorbing carbon dioxide and locking it in biomass and soil,” he says. Remove the trees, and you release carbon while erasing that storage capacity.

The dangers multiply with floods and erosion. “Deforestation removes root reinforcement, increasing landslide risk, accelerates runoff, and triggers gully formation,” says Dr. Kamale. “Sediment loads rise in rivers, channels destabilise, groundwater recharge drops, and water quality declines.” 

In Adamawa, floods now come almost every year, destroying homes and displacing thousands.

The damage extends to wildlife.

“The animals we used to see, such as gorillas and monkeys, are gone,” says Jauro. “We don’t know if they left or died out.” 

Rosewood provides shelter for these animals, ecologist Ridwan says. “They are also a food source as their leaves are rich in nitrogen. Their disappearance means animals and birds migrate.”

Satellite analysis reveals what the farmers, scientists, and ecologists are saying. Our Landsat data analysis (USGS, 2023) shows a dramatic transformation of the Gashaka-Gumti National Park between 2010 and 2023. Bare land expanded by more than 1,800 km² between 2010 and 2015 alone, a fourteen-fold increase in just five years. Farmland and sparse vegetation actually shrank by nearly 80 km² during the same period, proving that this was no slow encroachment by farmers but a rapid, organised logging boom. By 2020, cleared land exceeded 2,050 km². Even after a slight recovery by 2023, dense forest cover stood at just 39.8 km², far below pre-boom levels, leaving the park deeply scarred.

Experts say the solutions must begin where the damage began. “Even some security agents don’t understand the environmental laws,” Ridwan laments. “The government must involve the communities, enlighten them on the risks, and provide sustainable alternatives like beekeeping or shea butter processing. These are more profitable and ecologically sound. But the key is community ownership.”

Dr. Kamale recommends protecting riparian zones and steep headwaters, restricting logging on fragile soils, building erosion control structures like check dams, reforesting degraded slopes with native species, enforcing low-impact harvesting, and strengthening Nigeria–Cameroon cooperation on monitoring.

But money remains the missing piece. NPS boss Goni admits enforcement cannot rely on security agencies alone. “Half the success depends on local communities,” he says. “We have begun training people with new skills and giving starter packs for alternative livelihoods. It has reduced hunting and logging in some areas. But we need more resources to make this sustainable.”

The last ride

It is dawn. Nathaniel and his crew emerge from the forest, three men on a motorcycle, just as they had gone in. 

They will not make this trip again for months, Nathaniel says. The trees are thinning out. The dealers have moved south, to Cross River, where rosewood still grows in abundance. 

“The market is no longer like it used to be,” he tells us. “The people from Lagos don’t come anymore. The foreigners too, we don’t see them like before.”

He sits on the stump of a felled rosewood at the depot outside Sunawara, where he speaks to us.

The air here is damp and cold; fog drifts between the few remaining trees. We can feel the cold, despite putting on jackets. The temperature is below 19°C. A few birds call from somewhere deep inside the remaining trees in the forest, their songs thinner than was described before our trip.

Nathaniel looks towards the forest. He has made this journey hundreds of times, yet each one leaves him with a hollowness he cannot name. The money never lasts. The danger grows each season.

It is hard to picture the world Ridwan, the ecologist, dreams of, a world where bees hum between restored trees, where tourists come to see the wildlife instead of empty clearings. Harder still to imagine a government willing to stop the trade not only with arrests but with real work for men like Nathaniel.

A tricycle moves past, stacked with rosewood planks. It disappears down the road, leaving behind a ribbon of smoke and the smell of fuel hanging in the cold morning air.

*Names with asterisks were changed to protect the sources.

Satellite image analysis and map illustrations were done by Mansir Muhammed. Imagery was sourced from Google Earth Pro and the multi-decade Landsat archive of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), with official park boundaries obtained from the World Database on Protected Areas (WDPA).

This story was produced by HumAngle with the support of Internews’ Earth Journalism Network.

In May, floods swept through Mokwa, a community in Niger State, North Central Nigeria, killing over 160 people — the deadliest single flood incident in the country this year. Entire families were wiped out as homes, schools, and farmlands vanished under torrents of muddy water. More than 3000 people were displaced, according to local authorities. 

The tragedy was soon mirrored elsewhere. From Niger to Yobe, Adamawa, Rivers, and Lagos states, floods destroyed livelihoods and exposed the same recurring pattern: heavy rains, clogged drains, failed infrastructure, and official neglect.

Warning ignored

The devastation had been predicted. 

In February, the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NiMet), in its 2025 Seasonal Climate Prediction (SCP), warned that rainfall would arrive early in parts of the south and late in the north, disrupting the usual rhythm of the wet season. The forecast, designed to guide preparedness across sectors, again proved accurate but was largely ignored. 

By August, over 272,000 people across 25 states had been affected, and at least 230 lives, according to data from the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA). 

The SCP projected early rainfall across Anambra, Bayelsa, Delta, Edo, Enugu, Ebonyi, Imo, Lagos, Ogun, Ondo, Osun, Oyo, and Rivers states, while Adamawa, Benue, Kaduna, Kwara, Nasarawa, Niger, Plateau, and Taraba were expected to experience a delayed onset. Other states were expected to follow typical seasonal patterns.

It also warned of an early end to the rainy season in parts of Bauchi, Borno, Jigawa, Kano, Katsina, Plateau, Yobe, Zamfara, and the FCT, while Akwa Ibom, Cross River, Delta, Enugu, and Lagos would experience prolonged rains.

While unveiling the SCP, Festus Keyamo, Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, emphasised that climate forecasts were essential for strategic planning across sectors such as agriculture, health, marine operations, and disaster management.

Yet, three months later, the warning materialised — from the urban corridors of Abuja to the rural heartlands of Niger and Yobe.

Flooding in Nigeria, often seasonal, is tied to the torrential rains that sweep across the country from April to October. However, the scale and intensity of this year’s events, particularly the human cost, have reignited the need for conversations about climate change.

Epicentres of the 2025 floods

Niger State remains the hardest hit, but other states have also experienced catastrophic losses.

In May, Okrika, a coastal town in Rivers State, was hit by torrential rains that triggered floods and landslides, killing at least 25 people. The Niger Delta’s low-lying terrain and poor drainage make it particularly susceptible to such disasters. 

Up North in Yobe State, widespread flooding across the Potiskum and Nangere LGAs between June and August killed seven people and displaced over 6,687 residents, with more than 11,000 people affected. Farmlands were submerged, deepening food insecurity in a region already burdened by poverty and insurgency.

Flash floods also tore through Adamawa State, submerging at least 13 communities across Yola South and Yola North, displacing thousands and claiming several lives. In some parts of Adamawa, HumAngle found affected residents living in roadside shelters and makeshift camps, highlighting the scale of devastation and the urgent need for coordinated relief.

More recently, some neighbourhoods in Lagos were submerged for days following heavy rainfall. Gridlocked traffic, overflowing drains, and submerged homes became a familiar sight. The floods, which affected about 57,000 residents, underscored how unchecked urbanisation and poor planning continue to heighten risk.

Behind every data showing the scale of damage caused by flooding is a story of loss. Across the country, thousands now live in temporary shelters, vulnerable to disease and malnutrition, while the destruction of farmlands threatens food supply.

Major setbacks

Abbas Idris, president of the Risk Managers Society of Nigeria, told HumAngle that the recurrence of flood disasters reflects systemic negligence and poor governance.

“In Nigeria, we do not value life, which is why we keep allowing floods and other disasters to repeat themselves,” he said. “If we have a flood this year, and we know the cause, it shouldn’t happen again next year for the same reason.”

Abbas, a risk management consultant, said government response remains reactive rather than preventive. “Instead of activating proactive measures, authorities prefer distributing relief materials to victims after a disaster,” he said, adding that even these short-term interventions often fail to reach victims.

He pointed to poor drainage infrastructure as a critical factor in the country’s flood vulnerability: “In many cities and towns, drainage systems are either poorly designed, insufficient for the volume of water during peak rains, or completely absent.”

“Even where drains exist,” he said, “they are frequently blocked by solid waste due to inadequate waste management and public awareness. This leads to water pooling on roads and in residential areas, turning streets into rivers during heavy downpours and increasing the risk of loss of lives and property damage.”

Abbas also blamed uncontrolled urbanisation. Buildings are routinely erected in flood-prone zones, wetlands, riverbanks, and low-lying areas without proper environmental assessments or adherence to zoning regulations, he said. 

“If reckless urbanisation is the cause, then urban and regional planners and any relevant authorities must take responsibility for approving such construction.” 

In rural areas, deforestation and logging worsen the problem by stripping away vegetation that naturally absorbs rainfall. The result is faster runoff, soil erosion, and flash floods that devastate communities.

Without a shift toward proactive planning, environmental enforcement, and investment in resilient infrastructure, Abbas warned, Nigeria will remain at the mercy of climate-induced disasters.

De-escalating future risks

Experts have long warned that climate change is intensifying extreme weather events across West Africa. Rising temperatures bring heavier rainfall, while poor land use and deforestation worsen runoff and erosion. 

Nigeria already has early warning systems through NiMET and the Nigerian Hydrological Services Agency, which issue rainfall and flood forecasts to all levels of government. But, as Abbas warns, “Any early warning without early action is tantamount to inviting flooding to happen in the country.” 

“The only way out is adaptation,” he said. “But awareness remains low, even within government. We need proper education and sensitisation on climate change right from the grassroots. If we allow the climate impacts on the environment, then we are finished.”

What if you woke up one day and discovered your monthly income had shrunk to a tenth of what it used to be? That nightmare became the reality of Ibrahim Abdullahi, a phone repairer and PoS handler in Arewa Market, Abuja, North Central Nigeria. One minute, he had a booming recharge card-selling business; the next, his profit dwindled to a fraction of what it once was.

Ibrahim’s financial decline had nothing to do with his efficiency or work ethic. The market itself changed with the adoption of the virtual top-up (VTU) service between 2011 and 2013, enabling people to purchase data and airtime digitally via USSD, mobile banking applications, ATMs, and the web. Leading telcos such as MTN and Airtel first introduced the service. 

VTU quickly became mainstream, and by 2021, Ibrahim’s business had collapsed. 

“I used to sell about ₦100,000 worth of recharge cards in a day, but when people stopped buying paper recharge cards, I wasn’t able to sell up to ₦10,000 daily,” he recounted with eyes fixed on the phone he was repairing, as if any glance away might cost his income. 

But for people like Ibrahim, whose livelihood depended on the physical scratch cards, the change was devastating. Soon, as expected, the once-lucrative trade vanished, leaving sellers with lost profits even as they scrambled for alternatives. Three years ago, Ibrahim closed shop.

Across Nigeria, entire lines of work are being erased by new technologies, echoing a global trend.

The casualties 

Scratch-card sellers are not alone.

Wuraola Adebisi* used to be a call centre agent in the ‘90s. With low mobile-phone penetration, people depended on her service for communication and were charged per second. In 1999, she gained admission and left for tertiary education, hoping to return to the business afterwards.

However, even before she got her diploma, mobile telephony was introduced in 2001, ending the monopoly of Nigerian Telecommunications Limited, which was the sole provider of the common wired telephony, but also keeping call centre agents like Wuraola out of business. 

“The call centre business left by itself because people now had phones in their hands,” she said.

These changes, while detrimental to those who lose, are a natural part of the way the world evolves. A survey conducted by HumAngle in Nigeria also shows this trend: 15 per cent of respondents attributed their job loss to the advent of technologies such as artificial intelligence and banking digitisation.

Globally, this is not unusual. The World Economic Forum projects that 92 million jobs will vanish worldwide by 2030 as innovation reshapes economies. But it also projects 170 million new roles, highlighting that while some professions fade, others emerge.

“While tech evolution may render some jobs obsolete, it also unlocks new opportunities in emerging fields like digital entrepreneurship, virtual assistance, cybersecurity, data analysis, amongst others,” Ponfa Miri, Team Lead of Langtang Innovation Hub, a non-profit tech skills training institute based in rural Plateau State, told HumAngle. 

This balance between loss and opportunity is already visible in Nigeria.

When scratch-card sellers lost their jobs, business people across the country found alternatives via other digital-enabled businesses like PoS operations, where agents sell cash to consumers. There are about 1,600 PoS operators per square kilometre in the country, according to the International Monetary Fund.

“I switched to the PoS and phone repair business because it was digital,” said Ibrahim. 

Yet, it was not simply a random switch. For phone repairs, particularly with the rising diversity of smartphones, he needed to learn new skills. The HumAngle survey found that 79.3 per cent of respondents are learning at least one digital skill, with 33.3 per cent doing so solely to adapt. 

The challenge, then, is not only about jobs disappearing, but about who has the skills and access to compete for the new ones.

Inside the digital divide

This rapid adaptation has its limits. As of May, internet penetration reached 48 per cent, according to the Nigerian Communications Commission. However, this still leaves a majority without essential connectivity, which UNICEF identifies as the first step towards acquiring digital skills. In conflict-hit communities like Birnin Gwari in the country’s North West, telecom shutdowns have lasted for over three years. 

Not only are several left without internet, but many who have access to it complain that poor national connectivity hinders their ability to carry out their jobs properly. 

Telecom operators argue that the interruption or slow speed is sometimes caused by power shortages or vandalism of infrastructure by armed groups, locals, or construction companies. For everyday Nigerians, however, these explanations do little to ease the frustration. The impact is felt most by small operators who depend on steady connectivity to survive.

Blessing Adejoke*, another who shifted from scratch-card sales to PoS, said: “People don’t like it when they’re looking for money, and it takes a long time for the PoS machine to connect. It’s not always a big problem, but earlier this year I nearly lost a full day of making money because my machine refused to go online.”

Connectivity and power shortages weigh heavily on operators like Blessing and on millions trying to learn or work digitally. With over 89 million Nigerians living below the poverty line, opportunities in the digital economy remain largely out of reach for the poor and displaced, HumAngle’s survey found.

The consequences are visible in the unemployment rate. A Nigerian Economic Summit (NES) Group study showed joblessness climbed to 5.3 per cent in early 2024, marking the third consecutive quarter increase. Young people, entering the tech-driven job market for the first time, account for 8 per cent of that rise.

With such situations, privilege often determines access. 

Haruna Bello*, a recent graduate, credits her private-university education and paid digital skills training for securing an internship that pays more than the minimum wage. 

“Before I applied for the role, my mum paid for a private course to help me boost my CV. I don’t remember how much it cost, but it was over ₦60,000,” she said. 

Haruna believes that her lucrative role could only be obtained through private-funded efforts and expenses, two things many Nigerians can’t afford due to the growing poverty rate. The result is a massive employment disparity between the rich and the poor, where a larger percentage of Nigerians remain unemployed, hired in low-income positions, or running small-scale businesses. 

To reduce these notable issues, the government has set out to introduce programmes that may lessen the digital gap, but these have yet to be far-reaching.

Government’s shallow fixes

In 2023, Nigeria’s minister for communication, innovation, and digital economy, Bosun Tijani, launched the 3 Million Technical Talents (3MTT) Fellowship to equip 3 million Nigerians with tech talents within four years. The programme, which has held two cohorts, has trained about 117,000 people. In isolation, the number may seem grand, but in reality, it barely scratches the surface of the estimated 100 million Nigerians who are digitally illiterate. 

Authorities at the sub-national level have also attempted to bridge the gap. For instance, the Plateau State Government in 2019 launched Code Plateau, a programme similar to 3MTT, over 1000 young people were trained, but the initiative abruptly closed after a political transition.

With progress so limited and the rise of more advanced technologies like artificial intelligence, optimism quickly gives way to doubt. 

“Who Nigeria help?” Wurola laughed when asked about government aid. Our survey respondents feel the same way: 40 per cent said they need government support to compete in today’s job market. 

However, some experts say the government cannot do it alone. Non-profit and private initiatives, especially those at the grassroots, remain vital to Nigeria’s digital transition.

“By working together, we can bridge the divide and create a more inclusive future, empowering individuals to thrive in the new economy,” said Ponfa, whose organisation has trained hundreds of rural women and young people in digital literacy and entrepreneurship.

Whether or not those programmes are created or enhanced, one thing is certain: the labour ecosystem is ever-changing, and many will have to find ways to adjust to it if they hope to stay afloat. As Wurola puts it, “This is the tech age. We had the Stone Age, we had the Iron Age. So, this is the age of tech, you can’t beat it. This is where we find ourselves, whether good or bad.”

*Names marked with an asterisk have been changed to protect the identities of sources. 

We want to tell a single story but follow three separate crises. 

One began deep in Cross River National Park, where a reporter HumAngle worked with walked into the reserve and found neat rows of cocoa where there should have been rainforest in Nigeria’s South South. Another began hundreds of kilometres in the country’s North East, where families in Yusufari, Yobe State, were leaving their homes because sand had overtaken them. The last came from a file we had kept alive for years — the Great Green Wall, Africa’s 8,000-kilometre chain of trees planted to hold the desert back.

With rising interest in Nigeria’s environmental and climate crisis, HumAngle has drawn from its pioneering experience using geospatial investigative techniques to strengthen its reporting and also provide insights to other reporters who want to make sense of the data they gather. These tools and techniques became central to uncovering evidence from the aforementioned stories.

At first, they felt unrelated. One was about farms, another about migration, the third about a wall of trees. But as the maps were laid out, aligned on the satellite imagery, and compared with the testimonies of locals and experts in the field, the three began to move as one. Forests are collapsing in the south, deserts are pressing from the north, and the only defence is a broken wall.

Righteous deforestation

The first set of coordinates dropped us in the dense green. From above, the forest around Ekong/Oban town in Cross River State looked alive and whole. But zooming closer, the stylish spiral shapes of the tree canopies looked different from the bushy, round type of the natural rainforest tree crowns. Natural forest crowns scatter randomly, and the spirals reveal human hands. Cocoa.

“There are a lot of farms in the area, though, which have also sprung up in the same time period,” said Olatunji Olaigbe, the investigative reporter on the ground. “One thing we heard happens is that virgin forest is logged, and then the cocoa farmers plant on it after a while and claim farms have always been there.” 

Olatunji’s GPS confirmed it. He had stood among young cocoa trees where laws say there should be natural rainforest. In fact, he had walked more than one farm, and locals told him there were many like the ones he had seen. To verify, we scanned further and identified two large sites having these same tree crowns as the place where he was.

The first was within walking distance. It covers over 3,000 hectares, with scattered individual patches spreading loosely through the forest. The hypothesis was that they had no formal system of land allocation due to their unstructured organisation. Like a traditional tenure system, where the lands have no visual demarcating boundaries. Likely by villagers from the neighbouring communities. They may endure inherent land crises and disputes. If they did, it may not be apparent from a satellite perspective as the crops spread freely and uninterrupted over the National Reserve.

The second site, a few kilometres south of this site, looked more structured. Covering about 4000 hectares, it was orderly: consistent crops, obvious boundary markers. We suspected that this site may belong to a major entity invested in cocoa farming or a group of individuals and/or entities in agreement. Each owns one or multiple lands, perhaps allocated by an authority. 

We then measured how much forest had been lost. By overlaying the Hansen Global Forest Change data on two decades of Landsat imagery, the picture sharpened into a time-lapse of collapse. Between 2010 and 2015, degraded forests were thinned and gave way to deforested land. Stable forest shrank by more than two-thirds. By 2023, what remained of the true natural forest was buried in cultivation and cleared lands.

From above, the canopy still looked thick. But its function was gone. Rainforest exchanged for cocoa no longer serves the same way. 

We held on to the impression as we travelled through the country’s North. If Cross River had an abundance of crops at the expense of natural forest, Yusufari was stripped bare of both.

Across dying sands

In Yobe State, reporters spent some weeks travelling across villages surrounded by dunes, such as Yusufari and other villages and towns towards the Nigeria-Niger Republic border, including Bultu Briya, Zakkari, Tulo-Tulo, and Bula-Tura. 

When the photos got to the newsroom, the story was immediately obvious. Settlements, where locals were facing severe water shortages, sat on a bright sandy floor. In some communities, children walked kilometres to fetch water, and in some communities, residents packed up and migrated across the border.

We turned to satellite sensors to understand what was happening beneath the sandy surface. Data from the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) satellite mission (2002 – 2017), which tracks the Earth’s shifting gravity to measure underground water storage, showed an odd pattern. Across much of the Sahel, from Zinder to northern Borno, Diffa-Yusufari region, and Southern Yobe, groundwater supplies had ticked upward. But Yusufari itself was an outlier: a flat line. No rise, no fall. A dead pulse for two decades.

The land was no better. ESA’s WorldCover maps showed degrading lands with surface water and arable land shrinking. Which is ironic because the land use satellite data we looked at shows that more than 12 per cent of Yobe’s territory is committed to cropland use, which is far higher than neighbouring Borno or Diffa. They were essentially farmers in a dying land unfit for farming. And so many of them decided to escape the advancing deserts. 

Another tool, NASA’s Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) aboard Terra and Aqua satellites, helped us track changes in vegetation over the past two decades. The sensor’s record of greenness showed that villagers travelling into villages in the Niger Republic and Chad were not escaping the arid zone. Instead, the sand was on their heels, following them across the border. 

Holding on to that impression, we examined these environmental crises at both ends of the country. The crises looked different, but the outcome was similar: green was disappearing, whether through natural and man-made exploitation. 

In the South, the forest is being consumed under cultivation. Meanwhile, in the North, the soil was consumed until cultivation was impossible. Faced with crises like these, the question is always: what solutions exist?

One answer has been environmental laws that protect forest reserves meant to safeguard natural habitat, but as we have observed in Cross River, these laws are often ignored, with little or no deterrence against exploitation. Another idea was daring to match global-scale desertification with afforestation, hence the idea of the Green Wall. 

Launched in 2007, the Great Green Wall promised an 8,000-kilometre shield of vegetation across Africa’s midsection, as wide as a city. A living barrier meant to stop the desert from devouring soil and lives. But, nearly two decades later, what has actually grown is far more complicated.

The broken wall

Reporters who travelled across communities along the Wall’s route in the West African Sahel sent back coordinates that were less precise than in Cross River and Yobe states. Insecurity made movement almost impossible. Many sections of the Green Wall corridor remain under the control of violent non-state armed groups, with villages emptied by displacement.

So we turned to geospatial tools to fill in the gaps, and there was an unexpected paradox. Across the Wall, trees were thriving in those places people had abandoned, but dying in many of the places where people remained or fled to. 

To measure this, we cut the corridor into grids — manageable 18-by-18-kilometre boxes spanning thirty localities along the Great Green Wall, from Nigeria, Niger, into Burkina Faso, and beyond. We counted trees in 2007, then again in 2025, using high-resolution mosaics and classification models.

The aggregate number went up. From 3.1 million trees in 2007 to 3.9 million by 2025, a 26 per cent increase. But the growth was concentrated in deserted places.

Across communities in Isa, a local government area in Sokoto State, northwestern Nigeria, insurgency drove villagers away. With grazing and tree-felling halted, and seedlings planted years earlier left undisturbed, tree cover rebounded dramatically — from about 60,000 to nearly 300,000. Dense weeds may have contributed too.

A similar situation unfolded in Burkina Faso’s Djibo, where abandonment allowed trees to flourish. However, in Karma, Niger, tree cover collapsed by more than half.

These contrasting shifts underline the uneven fortunes of the Great Green Wall. Participating countries often report progress; for instance, some media reports say land and vegetation in Senegal and Ethiopia were restored, while Nigeria has claimed five million hectares of reclamation. Yet in rural economies like Yusufari in Yobe or Isa in Sokoto, realities on the ground tell a harsher story. Reporters found Green Wall sites littered with dead seedlings, left untended.

“When I went to Yusufari, I saw that the materials were there, as well as the seedlings, but nobody was taking care of the plants. You just see them dead as you pass by,” Mallam Usman, an environmental journalist, recounted. 

Since the 2010s, violent groups across Nigeria’s North West and the Sahel have threatened the Green Wall efforts, especially in villages abandoned by locals. Based on satellite observations, the Wall grew more in places where people could not stay. 

The legacy effect

To understand this, we probed further using open-source records of past Green Wall and related projects. A “legacy effect” became clear: seedlings sown years earlier, before villages were abandoned, had matured into trees. Our analysis identified at least eight initiatives across Nigeria, Niger, and Burkina Faso that may have laid this foundation. 

We observed the new greens, which are thinner trees with younger trunks and reach. It made sense that 10 to 18-year-old trees would grow within the period of our satellite measurements. 

However, for some of these places, like Isa, the growth of a few dense weeds in the abandoned areas was likely captured by the sensors despite their calibration for growing trees.

Table 1: Tree planting initiatives that may have been the legacies growing in deserted areas. 

Sources: Synthesis of OSINT research, human testimonies and land cover satellite data extraction.  Table: Mansir Muhammed/HumAngle 

Reporting the crisis 

But numbers and pixels tell only part of the story. Behind every satellite measurement lies a human landscape: communities displaced, farmers abandoning fields, and projects like the Great Green Wall that carry both promise and complication. Capturing this side is harder.

“Reaching the people at the centre of these crises is often difficult,” said Al’amin Umar, HumAngle’s climate reporter, whose work focuses on the human cost of climate change at the intersection of conflict and humanitarian crises.

Yet even as field reporting faces these limits, specialised sensors help trace what is otherwise hidden. We have tracked water stress, deforestation, and migration, with satellite technology detecting environmental markers that reveal unsettling conditions across these regions.

From South to North, the coordinates, the pixels, and testimonies say the same thing: the continent’s edges are eating toward the centre, and the centre — the very wall where we placed our hopes for resilience — is already too skewed to hold.

Field reporting: Ibrahim Adeyemi, Olatunji Olaigbe, Mallam Usman, Al’amin Umar, and Saduwo Banyawa. 

All code and data generated for these investigations are available in our open-source project repository.

Beyond the Numbers: Inside Nigeria’s Insecurity Tr | RSS.com

On The Crisis Room, we’re following insecurity trends across Nigeria.

Every week at HumAngle, we track the state of insecurity across Nigeria: the attacks, abductions, armed clashes, displacements, and the lives caught in between.

All of it feeds into the HumAngle Insecurity Tracker, a data-driven project documenting trends, patterns, and stories behind the numbers.

Today, we ask: What does an insecurity tracker reveal about the state of a country? What do these numbers say about security policies, responses, and the future of communities at risk? Our guests are two journalists who live at the intersection of data, storytelling, and accountability: Adejumo Kabir and Abdussamad Yusuf.

Hosts: Salma and Salim

Guests: Adejumo Kabir and Abdussamad Yusuf

Audio producer: Anthony Asemota

Executive producer: Ahmad Salkida

Abubakar Ibrahim woke one morning in June to find his leg swelling. By nightfall, the entire limb was ballooned and throbbing, leaving the 30-year-old terrified.

“I took some drugs to reduce the swelling, but my legs continued to swell,” said the indigene of Malabu in Adamawa State, northeastern Nigeria.

Within weeks, rashes had turned to sores, and he realised he was facing the same mysterious flesh-eating disease that had already struck his elder brother and neighbours. 

Like many others in Malabu, he assumed the disease was a flesh infection treatable with antibiotics and bandages. He went to the primary healthcare centre in the community, where the sores were cleaned and dressed. He started to recover, describing his situation as mild, compared to others like his brother, who had their flesh falling out. 

While some residents sought help at the primary healthcare centre, others resorted to traditional herbs. Over time, Abubakar noticed the situation worsening across the community. The disease spread faster, and those affected often died within two weeks of their first symptoms. People complained of intense pain, sleepless nights, and a foul odour from the infected wounds.

An outbreak 

HumAngle learnt that the first suspected case of the disease was reported at the Malabu Primary Healthcare Centre (PHC) in 2018, when a man developed swelling in his hand. Within months, rashes formed, then blisters, which turned into sores. His flesh eventually tore away until the bones became visible. He died.

“We never thought it was something that would come to affect some of us,” Abubakar said.

Soon after the man’s death, a few residents began to experience similar symptoms, starting with swelling in either their hands or legs. Many relied on the PHC for wound cleaning and dressing, which offered some relief. But as new cases appeared, conditions deteriorated. 

Residents say that a few people continued to exhibit the symptoms over time, but not in large numbers, until the recent mass outbreak in June this year, and it spread rapidly in the following month. No fewer than 67 persons have contracted the disease since the recent outbreak, according to Alhaji Sajo, a community leader, with eight deaths recorded so far.

Although adult men have been the most affected, residents told HumAngle that children have not been spared, unlike during previous outbreaks. 

“Most of the children that are currently affected are around the age of seven and above,” Abubakar stated. He added that the situation for children is worse. Unlike adults, who mostly get infected in their hands and legs, Abubakar explained that the affected children have sores covering part of their faces that continue to spread and eat into their faces. 

To contain the spread of the disease, the local health authorities identified about 28 critical cases in Malabu and have since transferred eight of the affected persons to the Multi Drug Resistance (MDR) ward at the Modibbo Adama University Teaching Hospital (MAUTH) in Yola, the state capital, while the other 20 declined. 

Residents told HumAngle that histology tests have been conducted by the National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC). “They said our samples would be taken for testing in laboratories […], according to them, the disease is not cancer,” Abubakar said, adding that Malabu residents have remained restless. “We need to figure out the cause of the disease and how it can be treated.”

Dr. Dahiru Ribadu, the chairperson of the Medical Advisory Committee at MAUTH, said the patients are undergoing treatment under close observation. 

“We are taking care of them the best way we can, and they don’t pay for the drugs or meals because it’s being covered by the local government,” he told HumAngle, adding that even though the disease remains unnamed, admitted patients are responding well to treatment.

Abubakar’s elder brother was among those admitted, but he died days later. While he describes his brother’s case as critical, Abubakar has accepted fate and now tends to his own wounds at home. His greatest concern, he says, is to finally know what this disease is and how it can be stopped.

Non-contagious?

At the hospital, frontline staff are also grappling with uncertainty. Mary Jacob, the nursing officer in charge of the MDR ward at MAUTH, told HumAngle that the patients were brought in on Sept. 4. “There is no diagnosis. We are waiting for the investigation,” she said, noting that the hospital cannot give a proper account of the ailment so far, as it’s a rare one. 

The nurse suggested that the disease might be non-contagious, since many relatives caring for patients remain unaffected. However, she warned that it could spread through open wounds.

“If someone has the disease and there is another person who has a cut on their skin and they touch them, then it can be transmitted through the cut,” she said. Mary noted that one of their biggest challenges at the MDR ward is managing the deep wounds, which require large amounts of bandages and gloves every day.

While the hospital can only manage symptoms, state health officials say they are working with national authorities to uncover the cause. Felix Tangwami, the state Commissioner for Health and Human Services, suggested that the disease might be Buruli ulcer. Tangwami stressed that, while they await official results from the National Reference Laboratory, the state government, in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Health, is taking steps to curb the spread.

Buruli ulcer is a neglected tropical disease caused by Mycobacterium ulcerans, a bacterium from the same family that causes tuberculosis and leprosy. It often begins as painless swelling or nodules on the skin, which later break down into large ulcers that can expose bones and lead to severe disability if untreated. 

The World Health Organisation has documented thousands of cases, mainly in West and Central Africa, with outbreaks reported in countries including Nigeria. 

This wider pattern underscores why health officials in Adamawa are racing to confirm whether the Malabu outbreak is linked to Buruli ulcer. After the first samples were collected, Abubakar said that some NCDC officials returned three days later to take new swabs in Malabu. “They made provisions for some drugs and items for wound dressing at the PHC,” he said. 

In the meantime, residents are left anxious. 

“I want people to know that this disease is not just currently in Malabu alone, even though it started here. At the moment, other communities around Malabu have started recording cases, which means the disease is spreading,” Abubakar added. 

HumAngle reached out to the NCDC for details on the state of its investigation, but is yet to receive a response at the time of filing this report.

Nigeria’s Lost Children – The Crisis of Out-of-Sch | RSS.com

On The Crisis Room, we’re following insecurity trends across Nigeria.

According to UNICEF, Nigeria has the highest number of out-of-school children in the world, an estimated 20 million. That’s one in every ten children globally.

Many of them roam the streets of towns and major cities without guardianship or structured education. And behind those numbers are cycles of neglect, forced labour, trafficking, and recruitment into armed groups.

It’s a very quiet crisis, but one with consequences that could worsen insecurity, poverty, and instability for generations.

Today, we’ll hear from experts and advocates on how Nigeria got here and what it will take to break the cycle.

Hosts: Salma and Salim

Guests: Aliyu Dahiru, Dr Labo, Philip Dimka, Mohammed Sabo Keana,

Audio producer: Anthony Asemota

Executive producer: Ahmad Salkida

On Aug. 16, Nigeria’s National Security Adviser (NSA), Nuhu Ribadu, announced that security services had captured two terror leaders, including Mahmud Muhammad Usman, described as a leader of the al-Qaida-linked faction Jama’atu Ansarul Muslimina fi Biladis Sudan, popularly known as Ansaru. Authorities also said they had detained Mahmud al-Nigeri, who is associated with the emergent Mahmuda network in North Central Nigeria. 

The arrests, made during operations that spanned May to July this year, were described by the NSA as “the most decisive blow against Ansaru” since its inception, with officials hinting that digital material seized could unlock additional cells and enable follow-on arrests. 

“These two men have jointly spearheaded multiple attacks on civilians, security forces and critical national infrastructure. They are currently in custody and will face due legal process,” Ribadu noted.

For a government under pressure to tame overlapping threats from terrorists, this is a political and operational win. The harder question is whether it marks an actual turning point in a fragmented conflict that has repeatedly adapted to leadership losses. 

A short history of a long problem

Ansaru emerged publicly in early 2012 as a breakaway from Boko Haram after years of quiet cross-border travel, training, and ideological cross-pollination with al-Qaida affiliates. 

The split reflected disagreements over targeting and ideological tactics. While Boko Haram, under Abubakar Shekau, embraced mass-casualty violence, including suicide attacks that killed several civilians, including Muslims, Ansaru positioned itself as a more “discriminating” outfit, focused on Western and high-profile Nigerian targets and on hostage-taking for leverage. 

The group’s founders, notably Khalid al-Barnawi and Abubakar Adam Kambar, had networks developed through al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), which shaped their doctrine and operational tactics. This lineage remains crucial for understanding Ansaru’s strategic choices and its enduring connections in the Sahel. 

Ansaru’s first phase was brief but consequential. Between late 2012 and early 2013, the group was credibly linked to a string of operations: the storming of a detention site in Abuja, the country’s capital city, on November 2012, the attack on a Nigerian convoy bound for Mali in January 2013, and, most notoriously, the 2013 kidnapping of seven expatriate workers from a Setraco construction camp in Jama’are, Bauchi State in the country’s North East. The hostages were later killed, and Ansaru circulated a proof-of-death video that stunned Nigeria’s security community. 

Those incidents cemented the group’s image as an al-Qaida-influenced kidnap-and-assault specialist rather than a proto-governance insurgency. 

Two leadership shocks then disrupted Ansaru’s momentum. In 2012, Abubakar Adam Kambar, the group’s first commander, was reported killed during a security operation, elevating Khalid Barnawi’s importance inside the network. 

In April 2016, security forces arrested Khalid al-Barnawi in Lokoja, Kogi State, in the North Central, an event that was widely seen as decapitating Ansaru’s remaining central structure. Ansaru then disappeared from public claim streams for several years after that arrest, an action that suggested the group’s command and control was genuinely degraded. 

However, in January 2020, Ansaru reappeared with an ambush on the convoy of the Emir of Potiskum as it transited through Kaduna State in the North West. Later that year, it issued additional claims in the same region, signalling a pivot from its northeastern birthplace toward spaces where state presence was thinner and terror violence had created both a security vacuum and a recruitment market. 

Reports, including one published by HumAngle, traced some of this revival to the group’s continued ties with al-Qaida affiliates in the Sahel and pragmatic cohabitation with terror gangs, whether through facilitation, training, or weapons flows. 

Why the recent arrests matter

The recent arrests resemble earlier moments when big names like Abubakar Adam Kambar were taken off the battlefield. Officials say Mahmud Muhammad Usman and his counterpart from the Mahmuda network were not only operational leaders but also brokers of transnational connections, including alleged roles in orchestrating the 2022 Kuje prison break and in a 2013 attack against a Nigerien uranium site.

“Malam Mamuda, was said to have trained in Libya between 2013 and 2015 under foreign jihadist instructors from Egypt, Tunisia, and Algeria, specialising in weapons handling and Improvised Explosive Device (IED) fabrication,” Ribadu said

Those claims serve a dual purpose. They frame the detentions as part of a campaign that reaches beyond Nigeria’s borders, and they signal to international partners that Abuja is aligning against a regional terrorist web that spans from Northern Nigeria through Niger and into Mali and Burkina Faso. 

The tactical benefits are clearer. Removing senior fixers disrupts the flow of money, weapons, and specialised expertise that enable small cadres to punch above their numerical weight.

The haul of digital media, if exploited quickly, can reveal safe-route maps, dead-drop protocols, and liaisons inside other terror syndicates that lease out men and terrain in north-west and north-central Nigeria. When combined with focused policing in towns and market hubs, that intelligence can shrink Ansaru’s margins for clandestine movement and fundraising. 

None of this ends the threat on its own, but it changes the tempo and increases the cost to operate.

What is Ansaru, and what is it not?

To understand fully what this moment means, it is useful to situate Ansaru among the three principal jihadist currents that affect Nigeria today: Boko Haram’s Jama’atu Ahlis-Sunna lid-Da‘wa wal-Jihad (often called “JAS” or “Shekau’s faction”), the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP), and Ansaru itself.

JAS was, for years, the most visible face of the insurgency, built around an absolutist and takfiri reading of Salafi-Jihadism, and operationalised through terror attacks that did not distinguish Muslim civilians from security targets. The Shekau era normalised female suicide bombers, mass abductions, and village-level depopulation. Governance was secondary to spectacle and intimidation. Since Shekau died in 2021, JAS has splintered and receded in some arenas, although pockets remain capable of lethal violence. 

ISWAP is different. Born of a schism with Shekau, it has tended to emphasise territorial management in the Lake Chad Basin, with taxation, shadow court systems, and calibrated violence designed, at least nominally, to avoid indiscriminate Muslim casualties. Its commanders often court pragmatic relationships with traders and smugglers, and, unlike JAS in its prime, ISWAP markets itself as predictable enough for civilians to bargain with and understand. International Crisis Group and other researchers have long highlighted these governance motifs as operational advantages, even as ISWAP continues to attack military positions and abduct civilians. 

Ansaru occupies a third lane. Its al-Qaida genealogy predisposes it toward targeted kidnappings of foreigners and high-profile Nigerians, ambushes of convoys, and the cultivation of rural social capital.

During its 2020 and 2022 push in the North West, Ansaru proselytisers distributed food and farm inputs, positioned themselves as protectors against predatory terrorists, and sought to embed preachers who preached against secular politics and democratic participation. This hearts-and-minds approach was less about running a taxation state and more about building safe communities of sympathy to hide in, recruit from, and extract logistics support. 

Ideologically, Ansaru’s guides are AQIM and, by extension, JNIM in the Sahel. That lineage favours calibrated violence, prolonged detentions rather than mass executions, and strategic hostage bargaining, as seen in the Setraco case and other high-profile kidnappings from 2012 to 2013. It also means Ansaru is plugged into the Sahelian marketplace for weapons, trainers, and media distribution, which helps explain its periodic ability to rebound after leadership losses. 

A map of influence, not of control

In the North East, ISWAP and residual JAS cells dominate the insurgent landscape. Ansaru’s post-2019 story unfolded more in Kaduna’s rural west and parts of neighbouring states, where the absence of policing and the rise of kidnap-for-ransom gangs created both a protection racket and an opportunity for ideological entrepreneurs. 

Birnin Gwari Local Government Area in Kaduna State became a shorthand for that nexus. Residents and local leaders reported that Ansaru courted communities, fought some local terrorist groups, and tried to regulate flows on key feeder roads. 

Media and civil society reports described the group distributing Sallah gifts in Kuyello and influencing daily life in and around Damari and other settlements. These were snapshots of temporary influence, not evidence of continuous territorial control, but they were a warning sign that non-state governance was thickening in spaces where the state was thin. 

That is the context in which Ribadu’s announcement landed. If the commanders arrested were connective tissue between al-Qaida-adjacent logisticians, local fixers, and local terrorist entrepreneurs, then removing them will reverberate in Birnin Gwari and similar corridors. It is also why the arrests were paired rhetorically with claims about plots and partnerships far from Kaduna, including across the Maghreb and the Sahel. 

The Federal Government wants Nigerians to see Ansaru not as another rural gang, but as a node in a continental web that justifies sustained, internationally backed counterterrorism.

Lessons from 2012 and 2016

This is not Nigeria’s first experience with decapitation strikes against Ansaru. In 2012, the reported killing of Kambar set off internal adjustments. 

In 2016, the arrest of Khalid al-Barnawi appeared to shutter Ansaru’s media pipeline and disrupt its external ties, which supports the argument that leadership matters for a relatively small, networked faction. 

Yet by 2020, the group was reclaiming relevance in the northwest, an adaptation that coincided with the Sahel’s worsening jihadist crisis and the metastasis of rural banditry inside Nigeria. 

This short history suggests a dual lesson: Taking leaders off the board works, especially when accompanied by seizures of communications and couriers.  However, it works less well when ungoverned spaces expand faster than the state can fill them and when adjacent theatres, like Mali and Burkina Faso, are producing more seasoned cadres than the region can absorb.

Operations that shaped Ansaru

Ansaru’s brand was shaped by a handful of headline incidents:

Kidnapping and killing of foreign construction workers, Jama’are, Bauchi State, February–March 2013. Seven expatriates seized from Setraco’s compound were later executed after a period of captivity. The case demonstrated Ansaru’s preference for hostage taking aimed at political signalling and bargaining leverage, even if the outcome was ultimately murderous. 

Attack on Nigerian troops en route to Mali, Kogi State, January 2013. As Abuja prepared to contribute forces to the international intervention against jihadists in northern Mali, Ansaru claimed a lethal ambush that underlined its Sahel-centric framing and its willingness to hit military targets to deter Nigeria’s regional role. 

A cluster of 2012 operations, including an assault on a detention facility in Abuja and kidnappings such as the abduction of a French national. The pattern resembled AQIM’s repertoire in the Sahel more than Boko Haram’s campaign in Borno, with a focus on foreigners, convoys, and facilities that maximised international attention. 

More recently, investigators and journalists have traced Ansaru’s fingerprints to influence activities in Kaduna’s rural belt, including the deployment of preachers, gift distribution to farmers, and cooperation or competition with bandit factions. Even where attribution is contested, the persistence of these reports speaks to Ansaru’s hybrid strategy of armed proselytisation and transactional coexistence.

What the arrests change, and what they do not

The most optimistic reading is that neutralising senior Ansaru leaders will slow operational planning, complicate cross-border procurement of arms, and deter terrorist groups from entering into further tactical pacts. In the near term, that could translate into fewer complex ambushes, fewer kidnappings with political messaging, and a reduction in the movement of specialist bombmakers or media operatives between northwest Nigeria and Sahelian fronts.

If the digital evidence that Ribadu referenced is robust and rapidly exploited, the state could also roll up facilitators in markets, transport unions, and phone shops that act as the quiet arteries of clandestine groups. 

A more cautious reading is grounded in Ansaru’s history and the adaptive ecology of violence in the North West. The group is small, but it has repeatedly used alliances to magnify its reach. If surviving mid-level cadres can maintain relationships with bandit-terror leaders who control forest sanctuaries and rural taxation points, Ansaru can regenerate a functional structure even without marquee names at the top. 

In some cases, the brand itself is a currency: men can claim to be acting on behalf of Ansaru to secure access, while the real command node sits far away and communicates sparingly. Detentions alone do not break that reputational economy.

There is also the question of displacement. Pressure in one theatre can push cadres into neighbouring spaces. As long as Sahelian conflict systems continue to produce itinerant trainers and brokers with AQIM or JNIM pedigrees, there will be a supply to meet Nigeria’s demand for clandestine services. Here, the government’s signalling about cross-border links is more than public relations. It points toward the necessity of intelligence sharing with Niger, and, depending on the political climate, with authorities in Mali and Burkina Faso, where applicable. Securing those partnerships in an era of coups and shifting alliances is not a technical task. It is political.

What would “success” look like six months from now?

A realistic definition of success is not zero attacks, but measurable attrition in Ansaru’s facilitation capacity and a visible shrinking of its rural social space. There are indicators Nigerians can watch for:

• Fewer kidnap incidents with clear ideological framing in Kaduna’s rural west and adjacent corridors, and more arrests of kidnap coordinators with al-Qaida ties.
• Disruption of preacher networks that have been used to socialise communities into Ansaru’s worldview, ideally with community-led alternatives filling the vacuum.
• Intelligence-led seizures on trunk and feeder roads that connect markets in Kaduna and Niger States to forest hideouts, particularly around Birnin Gwari, Kuyello, and Damari.
• Public defections of mid-level facilitators following a perception that the brand can no longer protect them from arrest or rival bandits.

If kidnappings bridge into the harvest season with familiar signatures, or if new names suddenly surface to replace those detained, then the state will need to ask whether it has struck the right balance between kinetic pressure and political management of the rural economy of violence.

The bottom line

Ribadu’s announcement is welcome news in a war that has lacked good headlines. For a government facing simultaneous pressure in the North East and the North West, removing Ansaru leaders offers a chance to disrupt one of the more insidious cross-border pipelines feeding violence in Nigeria’s heartland. 

The history, though, counsels humility. Ansaru has absorbed leadership losses before, gone quiet, and then reconstituted itself where the state was weakest. What comes next will depend less on what was said at a podium than on what happens on back roads and in forest clearings, at checkpoints and market stalls, and in the daily bargains between frightened communities and the armed men who claim to protect or prey on them.

If the new arrests are leveraged to dismantle facilitation networks, to keep pressure on safe havens, and to fill the governance gap that Ansaru has so skillfully exploited, then Nigeria could indeed be at a turning point. If not, the country risks watching this chapter follow the pattern of 2012 and 2016, when a decapitated network lay low and then returned in a new guise. 

The choice now is whether to treat this as a headline or as the start of a sustained campaign that finally closes Ansaru’s page in Nigeria’s long insurgent story. 

Officials say about 10 people rescued after accident in African country’s northwestern region.

Rescuers are searching for more than 40 people who are missing after a boat capsized in Nigeria’s northwestern state of Sokoto, according to authorities.

Nigeria’s National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) said on Sunday that its Sokoto operations office had deployed a response team to support rescue efforts following the “tragic boat mishap”.

NEMA’s director general, Zubaida Umar, said the agency responded after “receiving reports that a boat conveying over 50 passengers to Goronyo Market had capsized”.

NEMA said in a statement shared on social media that about 10 people had been rescued, and more than 40 other passengers were missing.

Nigeria’s The Punch newspaper, citing a local official, said the accident may have been caused by overloading, a recurring issue for boats in the state’s riverine communities.

Boat accidents are common in Nigeria, particularly during the annual rainy season, from March to October, when rivers and lakes overflow.

At least 16 farmers died in a similar accident in Sokoto State in August 2024, when a wooden canoe carrying them across a river to their rice fields capsized.

Last month, at least 13 people died and dozens more went missing after a boat ferrying about 100 passengers capsized in Niger State, in north-central Nigeria.

Two days later, six girls drowned after a boat taking them home from farm work capsized midstream in the northwestern Jigawa State.

On The Crisis Room, we’re following insecurity trends across Nigeria.

Nigeria’s security landscape is a complex and multifaceted one. The dynamics differ according to each region. In Borno State, there is the Boko Haram and ISWAP insurgency, and complications resulting from the government’s resettlement efforts.

In this episode, we will be hearing the voices of some HumAngle reporters as they offer insight from their respective regions of coverage.

Hosts: Salma and Salim

Guests: Usman Abba Zanna, Saduwo Banyawa, Labbo Abdullahi, Damilola Ayeni

Audio producer: Anthony Asemota

Executive producer: Ahmad Salkida

At the Muna Kumburi camp along Dikwa Road in Maiduguri, northeastern Nigeria, displaced families are taking desperate steps to survive. 

With the provision of humanitarian aid having been ceased for over three years and growing insecurity keeping them from farming freely, dozens of internally displaced people (IDPs) have begun dismantling and selling the very shelters meant to keep them safe.

“We have no choice,” Malum Aisami, the camp chairperson, told HumAngle. “People are in such a desperate situation that they sell their shelter and travel using the money.”

The makeshift tents, constructed from wood, tarpaulin, and zinc sheets, are sold for ₦40,000 to ₦50,000. They use the money to feed their families, buy seeds, cultivate lands in remote areas, or attempt to resettle in safer areas.

When HumAngle visited the camp on July 24, many spaces where shelters once stood now lay bare, marked by upturned soil and abandoned frames. 

While some moved into nearby host communities after selling their shelter, other families squeezed into overcrowded shelters with relatives in the camp. Many travelled to remote bush areas to work on farmlands, and some relocated entirely to farming settlements for the duration of the rainy season–a common practice among families in the region seeking seasonal agricultural income.

“I sold it so that I can use the money to go and buy seeds and feed myself on the farm,” Baisa Modu said, pointing to the plot where his shelter used to be.

Camp residents say the situation worsened when the state government began constructing buildings in parts of the camp, displacing even more families within an already overcrowded space. Some residents relocated to nearby host communities, but many remain in desperation for a good life.

“So far, we’ve recorded over 50 households who dismantled and sold their shelters and moved on. Even me, I sold one of mine. There is hunger, and we cannot go to a farm in peace. There is insecurity and abduction on a daily basis,” Aisami said. 

In February this year, several residents of the same camp were abducted while fetching firewood in the bush. Their families were forced to launch crowdfunding efforts, scraping together ₦300,000 in a desperate attempt to pay the ransom demanded.

Now, as hunger worsens and with risks rising, selling shelters has become a survival strategy, even if it means sleeping in the open or starting over in a new place.

Despite their depressing conditions, over 200 households were also forced to vacate parts of the Muna Kumburi camp last month to make way for a government construction project. The development, which affected nearly half of the camp’s area, rendered many families homeless, pushing them to seek refuge in surrounding host communities.

The camp, which accommodates over 3,000 individuals across more than 600 households, is now experiencing one of its most severe humanitarian crises to date. The perios is marked by food shortages, insecurity, and the gradual disappearance of what little shelter remains.

HumAngle reached out to both the Borno State Police Command and the State Government spokesperson for comments regarding the increasing cases of abductions targeting returnees in Dalori and the humanitarian distress in Muna Kumburi. At the time of filing this report, no official response had been received. 

Abduction cases are rising

After Boko Haram members abducted and killed her husband in 2019, Maryam Indi fled her hometown of Goniri Kadau in Konduga local government of Borno State.

Accompanied by her family, she fled to Maiduguri, the capital city, settling at the Kawar Maila camp for displaced people. She lived there for about six years until the government shut down the camp in 2023 and repatriated her and all other occupants to the 1,000 Housing Units situated at Dalori village along the Bama–Maiduguri road. 

She now lives there with her six children, she says, and life has only grown more difficult and unbearable since their return.

The 55-year-old worked as a farm labourer but stopped this year when suspected Boko Haram members began kidnapping residents who were going to the fields.

Her father-in-law, Ba Modu, was taken just five days before, while returning from the farm in Lawanti, a remote village in Konduga. He was one of eight people abducted from the community when HumAngle visited on July 25.

“The kidnappers demanded ₦1 million per person, but we couldn’t raise the money,” she said.

The abductors warned that Ba Modu would be killed in a week if the ransom was not paid. Maryam says this isn’t the first time their family has suffered such an ordeal.

“We have had three other cases of abduction in our family since we were repatriated to this estate. We paid ₦400,000 to free them,” she recalled.

But now, there is nothing left to give. And the process to raise the money is nearly impossible for many families.

“We used to go around the neighbourhood collecting donations from people, like ₦200 here, ₦500 there. But this time, we couldn’t raise anything. Everyone is suffering,” Maryam told HumAngle.

Maryam now begs in the markets across Maiduguri to feed her children. She said her daughter had recently narrowly escaped an attempted kidnapping while fetching firewood. Her son, who was with her, became sick with shock after witnessing the incident.

“We are scared. We can’t even go outside without fear. We are just surviving on begging and prayers,” she said.

Women like Maryam now bear the brunt of farming-related risks. While farming is often considered a male-dominated occupation in the region, the current insecurity has pushed many men into hiding, leaving women to farm in distant and dangerous areas. 

“Our men are afraid to go. If they go, they’re targeted more. So we, the women, take the risk,” Maryam said.

Since 2021, the Borno State government has implemented a phased closure of displacement camps across Maiduguri, relocating IDPs to newly built housing units in their ancestral communities or nearby towns. The policy was premised on restoring dignity, reviving local economies, and reducing long-term aid dependency.

As part of the exercise, at least ten informal camps in Maiduguri have been shut down. The most recent was the closure of Muna IDP camp in May 2025, during which the state governor, Babagana Umara Zulum, oversaw the relocation of 6,000 displaced families.

The government said the decision was driven by rising issues of crime, drug abuse, and child exploitation within the camp. However, the transition has deepened the humanitarian burden for many, particularly those unable to relocate or access livelihoods.

For many returnees, the promise of stability and improved living conditions remains unfulfilled.

Yakaru Abbagana, 30, another returnee, fled Shettimari in Konduga and lived at the same camp with Maryam before being relocated to the Dalori estate. She now lives with her husband and eight children in what was meant to be a fresh start.

“I used to be a farmer. Now, my children and I beg for survival. Sometimes my children and I go three days without food,” she told HumAngle in a faint voice.

When HumAngle visited her for an interview, her brother, Mammadu, had been abducted ten days before while working as a farm labourer in Lawanti. As with Ba Modu, the captors are demanding ₦1 million. The family cannot raise it; their only asset is the house gifted to them through the resettlement scheme.

“We told them we don’t have that money. They told us to sell our house for his release. But if we do that, we’ll have no shelter. Nothing,” she said.

Yakaru’s family had faced abductions in the past, too.

“Two of my uncle’s children were kidnapped last year. We paid ₦500,000 each to get them out. But now, we have nothing. Only this house the government gave us,” she said.

The uncertainty and fear have left many families choosing between starvation and the risk of death. “We are just begging. That’s our only means now,” Yakaru said.

On July 25, Nagari Bunu’s younger brother, Mustapha Bukar, 20, was abducted while farming. Ngari told HumAngle that, in two days, their family managed to raise ₦900,000 out of the ₦1 million ransom through community donations. 

He added that their father had considered selling their tent to raise the money, but community members helped. “People came together to help. They said we shouldn’t sell the house,” Nagari said.

Mustapha was abducted alongside others, but he remains the only one in captivity as others have paid and regained their freedom. The captors did not set a deadline but made it clear that Mustapha would not be released until the full ransom was paid.

Muhammed Usman, 30, is a community representative of the repatriated families from Kawar Maila camp, overseeing about 400 households now living in Dalori. His account reflects a community on the verge of collapse.

“This year alone, more than ten people have been abducted from our community while trying to farm. At least eight are still in captivity. The total ransom demanded is over ten million naira,” Muhammed said.

He explains that farming is not only a livelihood but the only lifeline left for many. Yet the farmlands surrounding Dalori and other nearby farming areas have become hunting grounds for Boko Haram.

Each time their community members are abducted, they resort to crowdfunding as authorities or organisations do not support them in the process. Muhammad says they do it alone year in year-round. 

“We rely on neighbours to contribute what they can to rescue victims. But now, even that system is failing. We are all empty,” he told HumAngle.

According to locals interviewed by HumAngle, security presence is patchy. Civilian Joint Task Force (CJTF) members are stationed in some areas, but vast stretches of farmland remain unprotected.

“The government helps by giving us these houses. But they don’t help when our people are kidnapped. No food, no aid, no security. We are on our own,” Muhammad said.

The displaced communities continue to appeal for urgent government intervention to address their growing insecurity, hunger, and lack of support in resettlement areas

A lunatic. An idiot. A person of unsound mind. 

These three phrases were used in The Nigerian Lunacy Ordinance of 1916, later modified into The Lunacy Act of 1958, to describe people battling mental disorders. Beyond these descriptors, the act stated that individuals with mental illness could be confined in asylums based on the judgment of a magistrate, medical officer, or family member, regardless of their consent to such confinement.

The legislation was inherited law from the colonial masters, copying the cultural norms of the United Kingdom’s mental health affairs of the 1900s. However, with criticisms from institutions like Cambridge, which argued that the act “hampered the progress of the mental health movement for nearly 70 years”, the UK came up with the 1959 Mental Health Act, officially repealing the old law. They described their new act as “a fresh provision with respect to the treatment and care of mentally disordered persons”. Among other changes, stigmatising words such as “lunatic” and “asylum” were replaced with terms like “mental disorder” and “patient”, giving mentally afflicted people the choice to seek help for themselves. 

Nigeria, however, had other ideas.

While the UK took this step in a new direction, Nigeria steadfastly held on to the 1958 Lunacy Act, and for decades, the country would show no signs of amending it. 

The urge for change went on for years, with judicial officers like the Chief Judge of Lagos State, Justice Olufunmilayo Atilade, asking for a reform of the Lunacy Act at a Bench and Bar Forum in 2016. She criticised the state of the Lunacy Act, explaining that the laws remained grossly inadequate and hopeless in dealing with the situation in Nigeria.

The Lancet Global Health journal also regarded the act in 2020 as “reflective of a period in human history not only when mental health was severely misunderstood but also when the treatment of people with mental health care needs was both inhumane and ineffective.”

Even mental health advocacy groups lent their voice to the fight. In 2021, the Mentally Aware Nigeria Initiative (MANI) hosted an X space, speaking out against the act and urging the legislative arm to repeal and replace it with something more humanising. Some Nigerian psychiatrists also lent their voice to the matter, with the President of the Association of Psychiatrists in Nigeria, Taiwo Lateef, explaining in 2019 that the Lunacy Act was inadequate, failed to define a mental disorder, and that it stemmed from a time when there were no treatments for mental illnesses.

For a long time, there was a desperate call for change, and after 65 years, Nigerian leaders finally listened to these pleas. In 2021, the National Mental Health Act was introduced, and it was officially signed into law on January 5, 2023. After years of waiting for reform, people began to see the changes in national mental health they had long requested. The Act was lauded, with people praising the government for enacting it. Mental health practitioners like Alabede Surajdeen also termed it “a cheering and good development”.

With five parts and 56 actionable sections, the long-awaited 2021 Mental Health Act swore to bring a monumental number of changes that, when implemented, would leave the mental health landscape in Nigeria forever altered. 

The Act promised a Department of Mental Health Services to truly focus on mentally disordered persons and a Mental Health Fund to ensure frequent financing. It guaranteed patients the freedom to consent to whatever was done to them and ordered mental health to be integrated into everyday clinics. It also proposed the formation of an independent Mental Health Assessment Committee to prevent abuses.

Despite its promises, most of the 56 sections of the act have not been implemented. The most glaring absence is the lack of a Department of Mental Health Services, as every other law governing mental health care in Nigeria is meant to flow through this system. 

The National Library of Medicine, a scientific medical journal, analysed the Act in 2024. It explained that the Federal Ministry of Health (FMoH) was supposed to establish a Department of Mental Health Services. However, as of 2025, the FMoH has not provided any updates on when this department will be created, and there is no mention of such a department on their website. Basic rights promised, like legal protection from discrimination and the choice to deny treatment, remain unenforced.

While the Act mandated affordable and accessible mental health care, the price and accessibility of therapy seems too high and limited for the average Nigerian. It also promised the integration of mental health services into primary healthcare, but most mental health units remain buried within public health departments.

This has led to many state leaders lacking the needed direction to implement the Act on a state level.  As a result, out of Nigeria’s 36 states, only three have recognised the Act, and only two states – Lagos and Ekiti – have successfully adopted it into their local legislation. Inadequate budgetary allocation for mental health, among other factors, explains why this lack of implementation persists.

In 2021, a study showed that Nigeria did not have a mental health budget. All the funding received for mental health situations was pegged at between three and four per cent of the total health budget, with 90 per cent of that limited funding allocated to Federal psychiatric hospitals. The promised Mental Health Fund remains a concept within the law, and the capital given to the mental health sector remains unnoticeable.

Another issue halting the implementation of the Act is the severe shortage of trained personnel. In 2022, media reports showed that only 250 psychiatrists were recognised to help over 200 million Nigerians. In 2024, months after the act went into effect, the Medical Report Foundation found that these statistics had not changed. 

At a ratio of about one psychiatrist to  80,000 Nigerians, experts say the strain on those meant to enact the Act is steep, making them move outside the country with their expertise. Just like psychiatrists, facilities are also greatly limited in the country.  The Federal Ministry of Health and Social Welfare has reported ten federal neuropsychiatric hospitals in Nigeria, each one dating back to before the existence of the Mental Health Act. 

While the existence of 10 federal neuropsychiatric hospitals may inspire hope in some, others have no faith in them due to mistrust of the government. Modupe Olagunju*, a final year student who has struggled with her mental health on and off for over 6 years, seemed disgusted by the prospect of attending a government-owned mental health facility.

“I would not attend a federal hospital for anything, especially not for my already fragile mental health. From my experience, almost everything that involves government-provided facilities in Nigeria involves three things: Crowds, bribery, and competition. Every regular healthcare facility I’ve been to that is owned by the government was poorly managed and overflowing with patients. I don’t believe a government mental health facility would be well-equipped to handle mental health matters professionally.”

Modupe’s concern for a lack of proper government-owned mental health facilities seems well-founded. While the Federal Government ordered 16 new infrastructure projects for the neuropsychiatric hospital in Kware, Sokoto State, in 2025, their efforts to improve mental health facilities after the Act’s existence seem to have ended there. No information about the projects’ implementation has come out since May, and no new neuropsychiatric hospitals have been opened since 2022. 

The crawl towards implementation can be attributed to the masses as well, as deep-rooted cultural stigma continues to influence the public understanding of mental health and therefore dampens the government’s push to do something about it, experts said.

A study by the African Polling Institute revealed that 54 per cent of Nigerians attribute mental illness to possession by evil spirits, and 23 per cent understand it as a punishment from God. Many Nigerians are more concerned with religious institutions than seeking out psychiatric care, which may discourage the government from taking action to better mental health facilities.

When Modupe was asked if there were any hindrances towards her seeking therapy, both before and after the Act’s implementation, she said, “It took me a while to convince my family to allow me.  My dad and my brother don’t really believe in mental health matters and believe Africans can’t go through such  a Western phenomenon (even though my dad has been diagnosed with a mental health issue himself). It was my mum who finally relented and took me in 2020, but even now, they are sceptical. ”

With a lack of significant effort from the government, many are worried that the Act does far more showing than telling. Paul Agboola, the Provost and Medical Director of the Neuropsychiatric Hospital of Abeokuta, notably told journalists in 2025 that “Togo, Ghana and Benin Republic are already implementing this law, but we who pride ourselves as the giants of Africa can’t implement our [mental health] laws that have been passed for two years now.”

The effects can be felt on a personal level. Modupe expressed her confusion about the Mental Health Act when asked if she was aware it existed.

“No, I am not aware [it exists].  I didn’t even know we had a Lunacy Act, and now we have another one? I am very surprised that such an Act exists because it feels like Nigeria has too many problems to pay much attention to mental health.”

As someone who has struggled with thoughts of ending her life since 2019, years before the Mental Health Act came to be, Modupe laughs at the idea that a positive change has occurred from when her struggles began till now. 

“In Nigeria, the [mental health]  law is just a suggestion.” She mused, “It isn’t something that needs to be implemented. Unless you have the right connections or adequate knowledge, the policy is useless.” 

Tomiwa Oladapo*, an autistic sexual assault survivor, also expressed his disbelief that the Act was a thing, saying, “I didn’t know… I think I didn’t know because coverage of stuff like that sucks in our country, and I’ve become really apathetic to this country. If something good had come out of the Act, I’m sure I would have known about it, but since 2021, please, what has changed?”

At best, it seems the Act has done little other than halt the degradation of mental health in the country, as no reports show a significant dip in the state of mental health nationwide since the its existence. In fact, some believe, on a private level, that mental health in Nigeria is ticking upward.

“At the end of the day, these discussions and changes about mental health in Nigeria are often had in privileged spaces. I do think people are more aware (of mental health) in Nigeria in recent days, but I’m not sure the nation itself is bringing about any significant change,” Tomiwa told HumAngle.

His views reflected those of Bernice Ezeani*, a 21-year-old NYSC corper who simply stated, “I haven’t seen anything significant from the government or state (concerning mental health) but from private entities? Yes. I also don’t know about the Act, but I know that private entities have been championing mental health activities even since before the Act.”

Still, for many in Nigeria, private efforts towards mental health improvement are not enough. “We have an Act,” Bernice states, “And so we should use it.”

Properly implementing the Act not only favours mentally ill Nigerians calling for change but also strengthens the country’s economic stability, benefiting all inhabitants.

This view is echoed by the Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI), a global health organisation, which showed the steep cost of underinvesting in mental health nationwide. 

The study explains that brain health, which is how optimally the brain works,  and brain skills, such as analytical thinking and creativity, are linked. Together, they are necessary for the sort of productivity that drives the modern workforce and therefore builds the economy. 

Mental illness is described as a major roadblock for brain health, and in a country where an estimated 20 – 30 per cent of inhabitants are estimated to suffer a mental illness, according to ReasearchGate, a monumental portion of Nigerians, if they has access to proper mental health care, could have a positive impact on Nigeria’s struggling economy.

Until the Mental Health Act brings significant action to back up the written law, its 56 sections will remain mainly symbolic. For the millions who need the promises it offers, the law without proper implementation will continue to foster confusion and hopelessness, with some continuing to share the same sentiment as an X user did in 2025, stating, “Mental health Act signed 2022 yet implementation is poor. Funding is also very poor, we still have a long way to go (in regards to ) mental healthcare in Nigeria.”

It is July 18, around 7 a.m., and a group of women carrying malnourished children are gathered at the primary healthcare centre in Adamawa State, northeastern Nigeria, to receive free supplements for their children. While waiting for the weekly distribution to commence, they interact with one another. 

Moments later, a healthcare staff member in a white uniform with a blue check yells from the opposite direction: “There is no RUFT supplement today. Go home and come back next week.”

Disappointed, the women place their babies on their backs and disperse in different directions. 

Twenty-three-year-old Aisha Adamu, a resident of the Ngurore community, where the primary healthcare centre is located, is one of the women who are returning home without the supplements. Aisha relies on the RUFT supplement as a primary meal for her malnourished daughter. 

“She has been suffering from malnutrition since she clocked 1 year. I have seen improvement since I started feeding her the supplement,” Aisha tells HumAngle. She is devastated because she has to look for an alternative meal for her malnourished baby, as the facility is facing a shortage of RUFT supplement. 

Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food, also known as RUFT, is an essential supplement used for treating malnourished children under the age of five. RUFT paste consists of powdered milk, peanuts, butter, vegetable oil, sugar, and a mix of vitamins and minerals. A sachet contains 500 calories and micronutrients. 

The crisis 

In 2023, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) reported that growing inflation, climate change, insecurity, and displacement impacted child malnutrition in Adamawa. That year, about half a million children were treated for acute malnutrition in UNICEF-supported facilities in Adamawa, Borno, and Yobe states. The number reflected a 37 per cent increase from 2022, highlighting how severe malnutrition was endangering children’s survival and development in North East Nigeria.

Ngurore, a community in Yola South, grapples with a severe child malnutrition crisis. The community hosts victims of displacement from the Michika and Madagali Local Government Areas (LGA). The primary healthcare centre in Ngurore offers clinical services to residents, the displaced population, and people from outside the community. 

To address the malnutrition crisis, organisations such as the Helen Keller Foundation, UNICEF, USAID, and MSF are collaborating with primary healthcare facilities, offering free health screenings and providing RUFT supplements to malnourished children.

Ahmed Mshelia, the data clerk at the Ngurore primary healthcare centre and one of the key facilitators of the malnutrition unit, expressed concern over the soaring malnutrition cases in the facility. Ahmed is not sure whether the centre can handle the number of people relying on it for aid. 

“Apart from residents of Ngurore and the IDPS living here, we also have women from Fufore and sometimes Numan LGA coming here to collect free supplements for their malnourished children,” he said. 

The facility attends to malnourished children every Friday. 

“So we have new cases and then revisit cases. The new cases come to register for the first time, while the revisit cases have already been registered, so they turn up weekly for the supplements,” he explained, noting that the facility records an average of five to six new cases weekly, which puts it at 20 to 22 new cases monthly; so far, there are over 50 revisit cases.  “We refer severe cases to bigger hospitals.”

At the centre, the RUFT was distributed according to each child’s weight. If available, the women could go home with at least 14 sachets every Friday. Aisha Abdullahi, a 38-year-old mother, received at least 14 sachets of RUFT supplement each week for her daughter, who is one year and ten months old. Aisha set aside two sachets for each day, ensuring that the 14 sachets would last her daughter for the entire week.

“I feed her with the supplement twice a day, morning and evening, then complement it with any available food,” she told HumAngle. 

In February, Felix Tangwami, Adamawa State’s Commissioner for Health and Human Resources, noted in a report that insecurity accounts for the high malnutrition rates in the state as farmers have limited access to their farms, which, in turn, results in reduced food availability.

Parents of malnourished children in Fufore told HumAngle that inflation is the primary cause of malnutrition in their community, as their husbands can barely afford three meals a day for their households.

Ahmed stated that many women who visit the centre lack sufficient breast milk, a situation he attributed to poor feeding practices, which consequently impacts the health of their children. For Amina Abdullahi, a 35-year-old mother of six from Ngurore, the primary healthcare centre is assisting her 2-year-old twins in overcoming malnutrition. In addition to the twins, she has another son at home who is also malnourished.

Amina registered the three children at the facility in February and has seen improvement in their weight. However, with the shortage in RUFT supply, she’s worried about their recovery process, which seems to be taking too long. According to Ahmed, the RUFT treatment is expected to run for eight weeks nonstop, but right now, it’s impossible to stay on track as parents struggle to keep up due to inconsistent supply. He explained that the women get the RUFT supply for at least four weeks out of the required eight. 

Amina expressed concern over the country’s inflation rate. The ongoing shortage of RUFT supplies leaves her anxious about feeding her malnourished children due to insufficient food at home. 

“Feeding is difficult compared to the past. Everything is now expensive, but we thank God for everything,” she said. 

Less aid

In May, HumAngle reported that the withdrawal of humanitarian agencies dependent on USAID funding in Nigeria affected displaced populations relying on them for essential services. This suspension was said to have deepened the humanitarian crisis in the northeastern region. 

The primary healthcare centre in Ngurore, which previously collaborated with agencies like USAID, is now feeling the impact of their withdrawal as the child malnutrition situation in the region is worsening. 

Ahmed explained that the facility’s aid from civil society groups has significantly dropped this year compared to previous years. For example, the primary healthcare centre, which used to receive hundreds of RUFT cartons from UNICEF, now gets only about 30. 

As a result, the facility now distributes the supplements bi-weekly, unlike in the past when they were shared weekly.

“The supplements are scarce, and it is required that the children keep up with the treatment once they start, but due to a shortage in supply, we sometimes skip a week or two in distribution, which affects their recovery,” Ahmed noted. 

He added that in the past, the organisations the clinic partnered with not only gave RUFT supplements to the malnourished children but also provided complementary drugs. “They give them deworming tablets like albendazole and sometimes malaria tablets and even distribute free test kits.” The situation has changed, as they only get RUFT supplements, and even the supplements are scarce. “We try our best, and if there’s a constant supply of commodities, then we won’t have problems catering for the children.”

Ahmed is worried about the recovery of the children, stressing that since aid is shrinking and RUFT supply has declined, he had advised parents of the malnourished children to augment the supplement with other complementary meals. 

HumAngle spoke with Umeh Chukwuemerie, a medical officer in the department of pediatric surgery from the Moddibo Adama University Teaching Hospital, Yola. He explained that children under the age of five require good food to develop their brain and motor skills.

“The child is growing, so he needs all the nutrients he can get to be fully developed because this is the stage where he is rapidly growing and his brain is still developing,” Umeh said. He stated that once malnutrition sets in, continuous treatment is crucial; otherwise, the affected child will become stunted, more susceptible to other diseases, and may develop poor social skills that might affect their confidence in the long run. 

Trading hope

In 2022, HumAngle reported the abuse and sale of RUFT supplements in Maiduguri, Borno State capital, at the price of ₦150 per sachet. The reports showed how parents went as far as inducing their children with portions to pass watery stool, which makes them shed weight and then qualify them to obtain the supplements that they [parents] end up selling. 

This sale of RUFT supplements, though fueled by poverty, has been termed illegal. 

Amidst the scarcity, HumAngle found that some of the women in Adamawa also end up selling the supplement they get to local traders due to pressing hunger in their households.

In front of an old motor park known as Tashan Njuwa in Numan LGA, *Babagana balanced his wheelbarrow at the Park’s entrance, where he displayed his wares. Among the biscuits, sweeteners, and other items he was selling, there were scattered sachets of RUFT supplements.

When asked for the price, he said, each sachet costs ₦400. According to him, he buys a sachet at the price of ₦300 from his suppliers and then sells it to hungry adults for ₦400, making a profit of ₦100. 

As Babagana explained, these suppliers are women who receive the supplement for their malnourished children from centres specialising in child malnutrition care across the state. However, he revealed that some healthcare workers sometimes bring the supplement to him. 

He has been selling RUFT supplements for over two years now, and while business has boomed in the past because he sold about 30 pieces or more in a week, the suppliers have barely shown up lately. 

“I heard that there is scarcity, and the ones I have will soon finish, but I might get some in the coming week,” he said, stressing that his RUFT customers are mostly older people. “They buy it as a quick meal. Then they mix it with boiling water and take it as pap.” 

However, Umeh insisted that malnourished children require the RUFT supplement the most, and there is no medical explanation for adults taking it. “It is not supposed to be sold commercially. RUFT is sent directly to primary healthcare centres but ends up in the wrong hands sometimes, which is sad,” he said. 

Ahmed added that some of the women in the community gather the supplements and sell them in large quantities while others sell one at a time.  “We hear them whispering amongst themselves sometimes,” he revealed, stating that some women sell half of what they receive weekly at the healthcare centre and use the remaining half to feed the malnourished children.

“When we tried to sensitise them on why they shouldn’t compromise on their children’s health one time, a woman explained that ten sachets fetched her ₦4,000 at ₦400 each, which she used to procure rice, beans, and other groceries that fed the whole family for a couple of days.”

While he’s aware of the food scarcity and inflation in town, Ahmed urges the women to desist from selling supplements, as this hinders the quick recovery of their children, especially at a time when aid is declining. 

While RUFT is currently scarce, organisations like the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations, with support from the government of Norway, are stepping up with alternative supplements like Tom Brown, a locally produced flour mixed with grains to prevent relapse in the malnourished children of the Ngurore community. 

“Distribution will start soon, and we are grateful. However, I fear that they might start selling this one too,” Ahmed said. 

Late one fateful evening, Malam Muhammadu Sodangi of Tuwon Tsoro watched helplessly as armed raiders made off with the cattle, sheep, and goats belonging to his family. The livestock, including prized ploughing bulls and small ruminants raised by his wives, were their sole means of livelihood. Without the bulls, Malam Sodangi cannot farm, and his wives cannot trade.

“They came in the late evening. My livestock and those of Malam Hamidu and Abubakar Garba were gone, making life very difficult for us,” said the 62-year-old.

In northwestern Nigeria, a surge in livestock raids has been linked to terror groups, with the Lakurawa group, an affiliate of the Islamic State in the Sahel (IS-Sahel), being among the most notorious. 

Operating with stealth, Lakurawa conduct their attacks through door-to-door, farm-to-farm, and pen-to-pen raids, often under the pretext of collecting zakat (an Islamic form of almsgiving). This strategy has wreaked havoc on rural communities across Sokoto and Kebbi States, leaving farmers and pastoralists reeling from the loss of their herds and livelihoods. 

Farmers and herders have been brutalised and the local economy crippled, leaving residents in a desperate struggle for survival. Lakurawa’s use of Niger Republic as a fallback position after each raid has made the group both elusive and resilient.

Muhammadu and his neighbour, Malam Hamidu, told HumAngle that since November 8, 2024, rural communities across Augie and Arewa Local Government Areas (LGA) in Kebbi State have come under increasing threat from armed groups.

Augie shares borders with Silame and Gudu in Sokoto State, two LGAs known to harbour Lakurawa hideouts. To the east lies Arewa LGA, considered the group’s most active stronghold in Kebbi, and Niger Republic, whose porous frontier serves as a strategic entry and escape route for the militants.

“The porous border has left Augie’s rural communities dangerously exposed to repeated attacks. Residents are routinely subjected to livestock raids carried out by the Lakurawa militants,” said Hamidu.

Operating from entrenched strongholds in Tangaza, Silame, Gudu, and Arewa in Sokoto and Kebbi states, as well as the forested regions of neighbouring Niger Republic, the assailants launch sporadic incursions.

Rustled Herds, Havoc Funds

In northwestern states like Zamfara, Katsina, Kaduna, and Sokoto, armed groups engage in cattle rustling as a means to finance their operations. Multiple reports have confirmed this. 

While an analysis by ENACT–an organisation promoting knowledge on response to organised crime in Africa–indicates that non-state armed groups have long relied on cattle rustling as a primary revenue stream, an estimate by the local newspaper Vanguard places total annual criminal earnings from livestock theft, kidnapping for ransom, illegal gold mining, and extortion between ₦200 billion and ₦500 billion.

Livestock remains a key early driver of this illicit economy, and this has long been the case, not only in Nigeria’s North West, but also in Chad and Cameroon. A study conducted by the Institute for Security Studies (ISS) in Chad and Cameroon revealed that “stolen cattle are sold to fund weapons and fighters.”

Academic research (via Tandfonline) has also stated that “cattle rustling offers a crucial channel for financing, especially for the procurement of arms and sustaining the loyalty of gang members, and this makes it indispensable to terrorism financing in the North West.”

Malam Hamidu of Tuwon Tsoro told HumAngle that Lakurawa’s activities in and around Augie, Arewa, Silame, Gudu, and Tangaza are reportedly funded by huge revenues generated through the sales of stolen herds in local markets.

Proceeds from these illicit transactions are believed to fund essential operational demands, including the procurement of firearms, compensation for local recruits, and the upkeep of remote hideouts scattered across forested areas in the North West and along the porous border regions of neighbouring Niger Republic.

A victim of livestock theft in Mera community, Augie, speaking on condition of anonymity, said:

“We learnt that whenever they steal our cows and sheep, they transport them to rural markets in Arewa and Bunza LGAs, where they’ve effectively taken control of local trade. The money from those sales is used to buy weapons, fuel, and food, and even to recruit more locals into their ranks.”

Communities shattered

While the cattle rustling crisis first emerged in Augie in 2021 with sporadic kidnappings and seizures of ploughing bulls by armed groups crossing over from Tangaza, Silame, and Gudu in Sokoto State, the situation has worsened significantly over the past eight months. 

Since November 8, 2024, attacks have intensified from the Lakurawa group through door-to-door raids. Entire communities have been devastated, and at least 27 communities have had their herds raided. 

The victims are mostly farmers and pastoralists, including women for whom livestock formed the household and economic backbone.

According to Babangida Augie and Lauwali Aliyu Sattazai, who have tracked the violence since a deadly raid on November 8, the losses are staggering.

“Apart from the Mera incident, which saw over 100 cows stolen, we estimate that about 2,000 cows and more than 1,500 other ruminants have been rustled in just eight months,” said Babangida Augie, with Aliyu Sattazai corroborating it. 

Herders from different ethnicities are affected. Abubakar Lamido, Secretary of the Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria (MACBAN) in Kebbi State, said the Lakurawa indiscriminately target both Hausa and Fulani herders.

“They steal from both Hausa and Fulani communities. As at [sic] the time of the Mera incident alone, Lakurawa have seized 120 cows, 51 goats and numerous sheep from Fulani pastoralists in Augie, under the guise of collecting zakat,” Lamido stated.

“They arrived at my home around 6:30 p.m. with guns and took away 32 cows, 27 sheep and several goats, including those belonging to my wives. We were left with nothing, not even a horn,” said Sodangi.

Malam Hamidu and Abubakar Garba were pulling ploughs on their farms when the attackers struck.

“They met us in the field with guns. They took away my work bulls, which we rely on for ploughing. From my farm, they moved to Abubakar Garba’s farm, also stealing work bulls and several sheep. Without those animals, we cannot survive,” he said.

Beyond material losses 

For some, the consequence runs deeper than material losses. In Mera, where the November attack not only saw herds of cows carted away but also left 18 people dead, residents now live in constant fear.

Alhaji Bawa Mera was among those affected by the attack. He spoke of losing not only his 24 cattle and his son, Garba, who was tragically killed while pursuing the Lakurawa in a bid to recover the stolen herds, but also his peace of mind, shattered in the wake of the violence.

“Since that day, we have not known peace of mind,” he said. “Some of us no longer dare to farm our distant fields. We fear we might not return alive.”

Sodangi of Tuwon Tsoro told HumAngle that he had also been having sleepless nights for more than two weeks. “Since the day they took our herds, I’ve not trusted any unfamiliar face. I’ve been having sleepless nights, and this place no longer feels like home. I’m considering relocating to a safer community.”

Crippling rural economies

Academic studies show that livestock rustling dramatically undermined the socioeconomic well-being of agro-pastoral communities across the North West. Herders and farmers lost their means of livelihood. In many rural communities, such as in Katsina, Sokoto, and Zamfara, rustling led to a significant reduction in household income, deepening poverty.

In Kebbi, it appears to be part of a deliberate strategy to destabilise livelihoods. Victims and community members believe the sustained raids by armed groups are intended to cripple the rural economy and instil fear across farming and herding communities. 

With each attack, farmers and pastoralists are forced to abandon their traditional ways of life. Many have fled their villages and farmlands out of fear, seeking safety in communities across Nigeria and the Niger Republic. Some herders, seeing their livestock as a magnet for attacks, have sold them off, surrendering their livelihoods so they can live.

“Keeping animals now is like inviting death,” one herder, who requested anonymity, revealed. “It is not worth the risk.”

“It is a calculated plan to destroy our economy,” said Abubakar. 

The increasing collapse in livestock ownership is fuelling a growing crisis: unemployment among rural youth, many of whom are now vulnerable to recruitment by the very armed groups tormenting their communities.

The economic toll has been heavy on both men and women.

“My wives have lost their only source of income,” said Sodangi. “Their sheep and goats were stolen. They can no longer trade or support the family.”

Communities respond

Many of these affected areas have developed some defence strategies. In Zamfara and Katsina states, there are community volunteer security groups called Yan-Sakai, composed of local hunters, ex-servicemen, and herders. The groups patrol forests, roads, and grazing corridors where rustlers often strike.

In the face of incursions and raids by Lakurawa, the people of Augie are refusing to fold their arms. 

With little more than grit, local knowledge, and a commitment to protecting their way of life, communities are stepping up where institutions fall short. 

The heart of this resistance lies in grassroots security efforts. Youth vigilantes, mostly volunteers, have taken up the task of guarding their villages, often confronting well-armed raiders with sticks, locally made weapons, and sheer courage.

“When our cattle were taken in Mera, Yan-Sakai mobilised immediately,” said a member of Yan-Sakai who asked not to be named for safety reasons. “We went after them, not because we had better weapons, but because we had no choice,” he added.

Fear and uncertainty

While pastoralists are offloading their herds, farmers face a difficult decision: whether to keep their work bulls or sell them to purchase ploughing machines, known as power tillers, in the hope that machines may be spared where animals are not.

Tensions escalated when reports emerged from some communities in Sokoto and Garu village, near the Augie border with Niger Republic, that certain directives were being given by the terror groups to farmers.

“Farmers are being threatened for attempting to replace their work bulls with ploughing machines,” said Abubakar. “The implication is clear: retain livestock that can easily be stolen or risk losing the right to farm entirely.”

Sodangi expressed growing concern: “We’ve heard that the Lakurawa have warned people [in other areas] not to switch from work bulls to power tillers. They don’t want machines in the fields, they want bulls, so they can come and take them. That’s why panic is spreading, and many of us are now considering relocation to safer communities. I am considering moving to Tibiri, in the Niger Republic, to stay with my relatives.” 

While the local response has been swift and defiant, official responses are not as efficient.

“They only come after the attacks,” said Babangida Augie. “We have noticed a pattern of Lakurawa scouting for villages first, then returning a few days later to strike. This happened in Tungar Tudu, Sattazai, Bagurar More, and now, they have visited Illelar and Zagi once. We fear they will be next,” Babangida added.

Call for proactive security

The stolen herds are not just livestock, but a symbol of broken security, broken lives, and broken rural economies in the North West. The trend reflects the growing humanitarian fallout of insecurity in Nigeria’s northwestern frontier.

“We are not just losing cows,” said Sodangi. “We are losing our futures, our means of survival, our confidence in government, our belief that tomorrow will be better.”

There is a growing call for the Nigerian state to ensure the presence of security personnel in rural areas of the North West, fully equipped with modern tools, training, and welfare support needed to confront the Lakurawa threat effectively. 

Without such measures, human lives in the rural communities in the zone and beyond may continue to buckle under the weight of a crisis that shows no signs of abating.

She lost her pregnancy in prison in what she describes as “a miscarriage of justice”. 

The experience Ayodele Bukunmi had in detention tore her heart apart and still haunts her to date. Now 23, Bukunmi was only 17 when she was thrown behind bars in Ondo State, South West Nigeria. It was October 2020, during the nationwide EndSARS protests against police brutality in the country. On her way to visit a friend in the Akoko-Akungba area, police officers waylaid and whisked her away, alongside protesters.

The police forced her to admit to obtaining flammable materials and causing riots in the state amid the #EndSARS protests, she said. After a few hours of interrogation, they locked her in a crammed cell in the Special Investigations Department of the Ondo State police. Bukunmi insisted she was just a passerby and not a participant in the protest that turned violent, yet, a month later, she was moved to the Surulere prison facility in Akure, the state capital. 

For weeks, no one knew she was at the prison facility. She was held incommunicado until her boyfriend, worried about her safety, found out. 

She was not alone in this situation; Kemisola Ogunbiyi was also arrested and detained in a similar fashion. Kemisola was on her way to buy drugs for her sick mother when the police picked her up, claiming she was among the #EndSARS protesters.

Kemisola and Bukunmi languished in the Surulere correctional facility with blurry hopes for justice. The duo came from different families and locations, but fate brought them together in a government confinement, where the slow justice system subjected them to torture and inhumane treatment. Interestingly, they both found out they were pregnant while in detention, begging to be given a fair hearing.

The Administration of Criminal Justice Act (ACJA) was enacted in 2015 to reform criminal procedure, promote speedy trials, and protect the rights of suspects, defendants, and victims. However, the criminal justice system in Nigeria has been criticised for being riddled with mediocrity and systemic flaws. With overcrowded correctional facilities, more than 70 per cent of inmates are detained often for years without formal charges or access to legal representation, according to media reports.

A report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) shows how indigent defendants, especially women, suffer disproportionately due to underfunded legal aid and systemic corruption. What the teenage detainees experienced at the correctional facility in Ondo confirms this report. For months, they were held in the police cell without being charged in a court. When the police raided the street and arrested them, they were framed for offences they insisted they knew nothing about. Bukunmi recalled how the officers wrote statements on their behalf, forcing them to confess to crimes they never committed. As hoodlums infiltrated the protests, burning houses and vehicles, including the All Progressive Congress (APC) secretariat, the state authorities unleashed police officers onto the streets to pick up the arsonists; Bukunmi and Kemisola, among others, were scapegoated.

“I was new to Akure at the time and knew nowhere, but they framed me and accused me of arson. They tortured me until I lost consciousness, and at the police station, they didn’t give me any chance to explain myself. I was humiliated and harassed,” Bukunmi said.

When they were finally charged in court, they had no lawyer to back them, and lost their voices before the judge. From the police station, they were moved to an all-female correctional centre in the state, where they would face another level of ill-treatment and dehumanisation. 

“They gave us terrible meals – watery beans and lumpy soups. We ate rice occasionally, and our regular stew was simply hot pepper and water. No palm oil, fish, meat, the typically grounded pepper, or tomatoes,” Bukunmi told HumAngle five years later. “I faced hell in detention and still went through hell after I regained freedom.”

The prison officials were cruel and tolerated no one, Bukunmi reminisced. She was once locked in a single, dark cell for over a week, with her legs chained and hands tied for disobeying an officer. She can’t recall the officer’s name, but she described her as “very dark” and newly recruited at the time. Her offence? She hesitated to help the officer clean her shoe. The officer reported her to a superior official, who ordered her to be locked in solitary confinement. They untied her hands once a day to serve her food and water while she was serving the punishment.

“I was still pregnant at the time, and I think these could have contributed to why I had a miscarriage,” she told HumAngle. “The prison space is not for the weak; you could be on your own, and an officer would accuse you of looking at them disdainfully and punish you for no reason. I didn’t really mean to disobey the officer; I was tired and sluggish at the time, and she accused me of hesitating to clean her shoe.”

No detainee dared greet an officer standing, even if they were older, she said. “You must always greet them because if you refuse, that could be a reason to be punished. And you must speak to an officer, you must be on your knees, with your head facing down.”

The ill-treatment meted out on them, experts said, violates section 8(1) of ACJA, which mandates that all suspects be treated with dignity and prohibits inhumane or degrading treatment. The Act also encourages non-custodial sentencing, such as community service and suspended sentences, particularly for minor offences. However, implementation remains inconsistent across states, and many people are still detained in overcrowded, unsanitary conditions. 

They were in and out of the courtroom for about eight months without a clear direction, until the story broke in the media in April 2021. Despite getting pro bono legal backing, the court still refused to hear their appeal, aggravating their condition in detention. This slow pace of judicial proceedings worsened their case, further violating ACJA regulations. 

The ACJA had introduced reforms like day-to-day trials and limits on adjournments to reduce delays, yet courts remain overwhelmed by case backlogs. A critique published on Academia.edu points out that despite the ACJA’s innovations, poor funding, lack of training, and resistance to change have hindered its effectiveness. Vulnerable defendants often languish in detention while their cases stall, violating their constitutional right to a fair and timely trial.

Foetus lost, baby born in prison

Bukunmi broke the news of her pregnancy to her boyfriend, Balogun Segun, when he visited her in detention. He didn’t believe her initially, but something terrible happened two days later. She started bleeding, and her stomach wouldn’t stop aching. She lost the pregnancy to the daily stress and discomfort she witnessed at the Surulere facility. The pregnancy was four months when she had a miscarriage, leaving her in pain and anguish. Her boyfriend cried out to journalists at the time that Bukunmi had no medical attention, despite her condition.

“She is not being given any medical attention,” he complained. “In fact, the foetus inside her hasn’t been flushed out. She needs help.”

Kemisola also found out she was pregnant in detention, but she scaled through the inhumane conditions. A few months later, she delivered the baby at the facility, catching more media attention. She was one month pregnant when she was arrested and detained in October 2020; she delivered the baby in June and still spent days in detention with the newborn. Her situation sparked social media outrage, with #FreeKemisola trending. Activists and social media influencers pressured the state government until Charles Titiloye, the state’s Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice, promised to intervene.

A few weeks later, Kemisola was released, gaining public sympathy and receiving donations from well-wishers. The baby was christened and celebrated by notable Nigerians such as Naomi Ogunwusi, the estranged wife of the Ooni of Ife, a first-class monarch in Osun state. Amid the media outrage over Kemisola’s case, however, Bukunmi was left in limbo with no freedom insight. The dead foetus stayed in her belly for months, making her sick. Some online sympathisers protested and moved on quickly. But her mother and boyfriend protested while speaking to journalists, expressing fears that the public might have forgotten the detainee.

“I’m afraid something might go wrong with her in prison due to her health condition,” Iyabo Ayodele, Bukunmi’s mother, lamented. “Help me beg the public not to forget her there.”

She was not allowed to visit a hospital even after complaining on several occasions that her stomach ached badly. At the prison facility, only one matron attended to their medical needs, and she was accused of handling serious issues with levity and sometimes oversimplifying complex health conditions. When she complained bitterly about her aching stomach after having a miscarriage, the matron gave paracetamol, but that changed nothing. She said she endured the pain for months, until she regained freedom.

Three months after Kemisola was released, Bukunmi regained freedom after enduring gruelling complications from the miscarriage. Her life never remained the same, even when she became free. The memory of those moments still haunts her, continually flashing through her mind, she said. When she falls deeply asleep sometimes, she said, she finds herself in a dark dungeon, weeping bitterly to be set free. Other times, she appears in dramatic scenes, dragging matters with the police in her dream.

“Even after I was released, I suffered a lot, physically and mentally. Unknown to me, the miscarriage had affected my womb. But God, time and medical efforts helped me take in the second time,” she added.

ACJA protects the rights of vulnerable women like Bukunmi and their unborn children in detention, but the reality in many Nigerian prisons is different. Section 404 of the Act states that if a pregnant woman is convicted of a capital offence, the death sentence must be suspended until after childbirth and weaning. While this provision offers some relief, it does not prevent pretrial detention of pregnant women, even for non-violent offences. One woman, Fausat Olayonu, for instance, was pregnant when she was detained for stealing a radio set worth ₦20,000. Like Bukunmi and Kemisola, she had no legal representation and had resigned to fate that her unborn child would be delivered in prison. The International Association of Women Judges reports that over 1,700 women in Nigerian prisons are awaiting trial, many of them pregnant or nursing, with limited access to medical care and legal support.

Although the ACJA provides a robust framework for reform, experts, including social justice activists and lawyers, say its impact is limited by weak enforcement and institutional malfeasances such as prolonged detention and inadequate care. Abdullahi Tijani, a lawyer and pro-freedom activist, says bridging the gap between legislation and reality requires stronger oversight, better funding for legal aid, and targeted interventions for vulnerable populations. 

“Until these systemic issues are addressed, the promise of justice under the ACJA will remain largely unfulfilled,” Abdullahi argued. “No doubt, Nigeria has proper frameworks to reform its criminal justice system, but compliance is a barrier.”

Ridwan Oke, a Nigerian lawyer and criminal justice activist, says reforming the criminal justice system begins with law enforcement agents, especially the police. During the #EndSARS protest, Ridwan helped facilitate the release of several protesters randomly arrested without a thorough investigation. The legal practitioner said the police need to check their system in terms of arresting people indiscriminately and charging them with ridiculous offences not backed by evidence.

“If the police can always check themselves by not arresting indiscriminately without any evidence, the criminal justice reform becomes easier,” he urged. “Police officers are fond of arresting people indiscriminately, releasing those they can release and charging others to court before looking for evidence.”

He also advised the court to be more critical of cases presented before them, especially cases lacking basic evidence. “Now, anybody can charge anybody without any evidence. That’s bad for our criminal justice system. The court should always put people in critical check and reduce bail conditions for lesser offences so that there would be no delay in justice delivery.”

From camps in Borno to street corners in Jos or online forums in Lagos, Nigerians are asking the same question: “Who’s responsible for our safety?” 

It echoes louder each time a village is attacked, a school is shut, or families are forced to flee again. The country is replete with soldiers and police checkpoints. A new special task force is formed frequently. Yet, the violence continues.

Across the North East, insurgents wage a relentless campaign, displacing communities and destabilising entire regions. Separatist agitation is volatile in the South East, feeding unrest and confrontation. The North West is plagued by the kind of terrorism that blurs the line between ideological violence and organised crime, while the North Central battles a dangerous mix of terrorism and sectarian conflict. 

In Nigeria’s commercial centres, violent crime festers, expressing itself through kidnappings, cult clashes, and armed robbery that no longer respect time or place. Each is complex, rooted in history, grievances, and deep socio-economic fractures. Though different, they all persist, grow, and adapt despite the government’s multi-pronged security interventions. For every new strategy launched or force deployed, the violence seems to morph and resurface elsewhere, often with greater ferocity.

The military’s grip on internal security

Nigeria’s reliance on the military for internal security is not new. A retired Assistant Inspector-General of Police (AIG) notes it began during the military era, when armed forces sought visibility and influence, often at the cost of the police.

Brigadier General Saleh Bala (rtd.), a veteran of many military campaigns and the president of White Ink Institute, provides deeper historical context. He links the military’s domestic role to the post-colonial period, particularly the Tiv riots and Operation Wetie in the Western Region. Even then, while police retained the lead, the military’s active support gradually expanded.

According to Bala, the real shift occurred post-civil war, with surging armed robbery in urban areas during the era of notorious figures like Oyenusi and Anini. The police’s inability to match this threat due to outdated equipment, low morale, and inadequate training enabled the military’s growing internal role. This, he says, was cemented further after the 1983 coup, where regime protection became paramount following attempts by then Inspector General of Police (IGP) Sunday Adewusi to thwart the coup.

These developments paved the way for the military’s sustained involvement in internal policing through state-led operations like “Operation Sweep” under General Buba Marwa, which set the template for numerous state-level joint task forces today.

The AIG remarks, “The result was that the police were denied funding for equipment and training, lost morale, and slowly withdrew.” Bala adds that while military interventions initially curtailed violent crime, overexposure led to diminishing professionalism and allegations of abuse similar to those levied against the police.

Soldiers as police: a reversal of roles

Today, soldiers respond to crime scenes, enforce curfews in peacetime cities, and patrol highways. The line between policing and military duties has blurred, with the military often serving as the de facto internal security force.

Bala agrees with this description but clarifies, “The military does not assume this role unilaterally. It acts only when requested by civil authorities and sanctioned by the President through the National Security Council.” He emphasises that this support role is constitutional and subsidiary, designed to help the police regain control and hand over post-stabilisation.

Where the AIG sees erosion of roles, Bala sees the outcome of evolving threats, particularly hybrid threats like Boko Haram and multi-layered terrorism, that overwhelm police capacity. However, both agree that the police must be revitalised to regain primacy in internal security.

Policing the elite, not the public

The CLEEN Foundation and a number of other civil society organisations in Nigeria have written extensively on the drift from securing the nation by the police to a troubling focus on protecting VIPs, in addition to widespread corruption and low faith in the police institution.

The AIG points out a disturbing trend: officers cluster around VIPs, leaving ordinary citizens exposed. This elite capture of police services, coupled with a dismal police-to-citizen ratio in most African countries, including Nigeria, undermines the safety and security of citizens.

Brigadier General Bala refrains from directly challenging this critique but shifts focus toward the need for the police to “rise above their preference for soft, high-profile urban operations.” He urges a move toward rural policing and special operations, citing international examples where law enforcement operates capably across diverse terrains.

He stresses political leadership as the driver of such reform: “The police need political direction to prioritise nationwide security expectations over elite security needs.”

Too many uniforms, too little coordination

HumAngle has, over the years, documented Nigeria’s bloated security environment, in which the DSS, NSCDC, Immigration, Customs, and other agencies frequently act in opposition. Intelligence is delayed, mandates are unclear, and many outfits lack focus.

The AIG calls for streamlining, suggesting that the DSS return to its 1980s and 1990s focus on community-centric intelligence gathering, while the NSCDC personnel be redeployed as a foundation for state police. Many analysts offered similar advice for merging vigilantes and dozens of self-help militias across the country into the NSCDC and maybe decentralising this outfit into regional police, rather than each state in Nigeria having semi-autonomous or independent security force.

“Rather than 36 separate police entities, we should have regional police that are in line with Nigeria’s six geographical zones,” a top police officer in Abuja said, adding that if state-based police institutions are adopted, governors who already have authority over local government administration “will muster too much power.”

The crisis of imagination

The AIG argues that Nigeria’s insecurity stems from a flawed belief that force alone ensures safety. Instead, he champions investigative policing, forensic tools, training, and direct departmental budgeting.

Bala provides a broader context: “Warfare itself is now institutionally all-encompassing. Security threats are increasingly urban and asymmetric. Policing must now be part of a whole-of-government, all-of-society approach.”

He warns of the “militarisation of all security forces” due to adversaries’ tactics. He draws attention to advanced democracies where police forces are as capable as some militaries. This, he suggests, should inform Nigeria’s transformation: building police forces that are not only community-responsive but also operationally hardened.

Restoring trust, rebuilding institutions

The AIG proposes revamping police colleges in Ikeja, Kaduna, and Maiduguri into detective hubs. He calls for merit-based recruitment and unassailable discipline to restore legitimacy.

Bala doesn’t directly oppose these views but reiterates the need for synergy: “Military, intelligence, law enforcement, and paramilitaries must become domain-specific specialists who can adapt across blurred threat boundaries.”

Both agree that trust in the police can only be restored through professionalism, neutrality (especially during elections), and effective public service—not militarisation.

Towards a new vision

Nigeria stands at a crossroads. Its current security model, built on elite protection and military overreach, is unsustainable. Both Bala and the AIG call for a pivot towards decentralised, professional policing, political will, and community-grounded justice.

Bala underscores the need for coherence: “The answer lies in orchestrated cooperation. Security cannot be left to force projection alone. It must be institutional, strategic, and inclusive.”

In a country overwhelmed by uniforms, one truth endures: security is not guaranteed by presence, but by purpose. And that purpose must be justice.

In December 2014, an incumbent president lost a re-election bid for the first time in Nigeria’s history. 

It was a time characterised by widespread anguish and anger at how insecure the Nigerian life had become. Boko Haram, the extremist insurgent group fighting to establish what it calls an Islamic State, had intensified its violence, killing hundreds of thousands, displacing millions more, and abducting hundreds of teenage girls from school. Bombs were also being detonated in major cities at an alarming rate. For Nigerians, the incumbent President Goodluck Jonathan simply had to go. And so Muhammadu  Buhari was voted in with unflinching hope that things would get better. That hope quickly turned into disillusionment and, in some cases, anger as things began to take a different turn than was hoped for.

Today, July 13, the former president, Muhammadu Buhari, passed away at 82, signalling the conclusion of a significant political chapter. As tributes from dignitaries continue to emerge and headlines reflect on his ascent and legacy, HumAngle analyses the impact of his presidency on the lives of Nigerians beyond the halls of power, in displacement camps, remote villages, and troubled areas.

An examination of the security legacy

During his time in office from 2015 to 2023, Nigeria faced increasing violence on various fronts: the Boko Haram insurgency in the North East, a resurgence of militants in the Niger Delta, and the rising threat of terrorism and conflicts between farmers and herders in the North West and Middle Belt. 

Buhari’s administration initiated multiple military operations, including Operation Lafiya Dole, Operation Python Dance, Operation Safe Corridor, etc., yielding mixed outcomes and levels of responsibility. While some campaigns succeeded in pushing back armed groups, others faced criticism due to evidence of excessive force, extrajudicial killings, and displacements within communities. Non-kinetic counter-insurgency operations such as the Operation Safe Corridor, which was launched in 2016, also came under heavy criticism. Though the programme was designed for Boko Haram members or members of similar insurgent groups in the northeastern region to safely defect from the terror groups and return to society, HumAngle found that civilians were finding their way into these programmes, due to mass arbitrary arrests prompted by profiling and unfounded allegations. The International Crisis Group also found that, beyond innocent civilians being forced to undergo the programme, other kinds of irregularities were going on. 

“The program has also been something of a catch-all for a wide range of other individuals, including minors suspected of being child soldiers, a few high-level jihadists and alleged insurgents whom the government tried and failed to prosecute and who say they have been moved into the program against their will,” the group said in a 2021 report. At the time, more than 800 people had graduated from the programme.

The programme also did not – and still does not – have space for women, and HumAngle reported the repercussions of this.

During Buhari’s reign, terrorists were also forced out of major towns but became more entrenched in rural communities. The former president launched aggressive military campaigns against them, reclaiming villages and cities. Boko Haram retreated into hard-to-reach areas with weaker government presence, operating in remote parts of Borno, Yobe, and Adamawa States. In these areas, the group imposed strict rules, conscripted fighters, and punished dissenters, often with brutal force.

A HumAngle geospatial investigation also showed how insurgency wrecked hundreds of towns and villages in Borno state. Many of the rural settlements were overrun after Boko Haram lost urban ground under Buhari’s watch.

Even with significant investment in security, a large portion of rural Nigeria remains ungoverned to date. As the former president failed to curb the forest exploits of Boko Haram, the terror group expanded control over ungoverned spaces, particularly in the North Central and North East regions. In Niger State alone, terrorists took over communities in Shiroro, Rafi, Paikoro, and Munya LGAs, uprooting thousands and launching multiple attacks. The lack of accessible roads and communication infrastructure made rapid response nearly impossible, allowing the terrorists to operate with impunity.

HumAngle found that, under Buhari, Nigeria lost many forest areas to terrorists, especially in Niger state. In areas like Galadima Kogo, terrorists imposed taxes, enforced laws, and ran parallel administrations. The withdrawal of soldiers from key bases emboldened the terrorists. This shift from urban insurgency to rural domination underscores the failure to secure Nigeria’s vast ungoverned spaces. Analysts who conducted a study on alternative sovereignties in Nigeria confirmed that Boko Haram and other non-state actors exploited the governance gaps under Buhari’s administration to expand their influence, threatening national security.

Perspectives from areas affected by conflict

For individuals beyond Abuja and Lagos, Buhari’s governance was characterised more by the state’s tangible influence than by formal policy declarations.

In Borno and Yobe, civilians faced military checkpoints and insurgent violence. School abductions like the Dapchi abduction and many others were recorded..

In Zamfara and Katsina, the president’s silence on mass abductions often resounded more than his condemnations. In Rivers and Bayelsa, the Amnesty Programme faltered, and pipeline protection frequently took precedence over human security.

What remained unaddressed

While some lauded his stance against corruption, numerous victims of violence and injustice during Buhari’s time in office did not receive restitution or formal acknowledgement of the wrongdoing. The former President remained silent during his tenure, as significant human rights violations were recorded. The investigations into military abuses, massacres, forced disappearances, and electoral violence either progressed slowly or ultimately came to an end.

Police brutality was a major problem during his tenure, leading to the EndSARS protests that swept through the entire nation in October 2020, with Lagos and Abuja being the major sites. The peaceful protests sought to demand an end to extrajudicial killings and extortion inflicted by the now-defunct Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS). For two weeks, Nigerians trooped into the streets with placards and speakers, memorialising the victims of police brutality and demanding an end to the menace. The protests came to a painful end on the night of October 20, when the Nigerian military arrived at the Lekki Toll Gate in Lagos and fired live rounds into the crowd of unarmed civilians as they sat on the floor, singing the national anthem. It is now known as the Lekki Massacre. Though the government denied that there was any violence, much less a massacre, a judicial panel of inquiry set up to investigate the incident confirmed that there had, in fact, been a massacre. 

No arrests were made, and activitsts believe some protesters arrested then may still be in detention to date.

Five years before this, on December 13 and 14, the Nigerian military opened fire on a religious procession in Zaria, containing members of the Islamic Movement of Nigeria (IMN), killing many and leaving others wounded. The incident is now known as the Zaria Massacre. HumAngle spoke to families of some of the people who were killed and children who were brutalised during this time.

Though these massacres have all been well documented, there has been little to no accountability for the aggressors or compensation for victims and their families. 

“My life became useless, losing three children and my husband to soldiers for committing no offence…I have never gone three days without my husband and all my children. This has affected my last-born, who is now in a psychiatric facility,” Sherifat Yakubu, 60, told HumAngle. 

“I feel a great wrench of sadness anytime I remember the injustice against my people, and I don’t think the authorities are ready to dispense justice,” another victim told HumAngle in 2022, highlighting the gap and lack of trust in the system created by the absence of any accountability after the incident.

Key achievements 

Beyond the headlines, Buhari played a crucial role in establishing a framework for centralised security authority. Choices regarding law enforcement, military presence, and national security circumvented local leaders and established institutions, exacerbating conflicts between the central government and regional entities. This centralisation continues to influence Nigeria’s democratic journey, disconnecting many experiences from those who are supposed to safeguard them.

Buhari rode into power on a widely hailed anti-corruption campaign, a promise honoured with the swift implementation of the already-proposed Single Treasury Account (TSA). By 2017, the programme, which consolidated up to 17,000 accounts, had saved the country up to ₦5.244 trillion. Buhari’s Presidential Initiative on Continuous Audit (PICA) eliminated over ₦54,000 ghost jobs, and Nigeria reclaimed ₦32 billion in assets in 2019. Under the same administration, Nigeria got back $300 million in Swiss-held Abacha loot. 

From 2.5 million MT in 2015, rice production rose to four million MT in 2017. In an effort to deter rice, poultry and fertiliser smuggling, the former president closed Nigeria’s land borders on August 20, 2019, a move believed to have bolstered local food production significantly. His government’s Presidential Fertiliser Initiative also produced over 60 million 50 kg bags, saving about $200 million in forex and ₦60 million yearly.

Infrastructural achievements under the late president include the completion of the Abuja-Kaduna, Itakpe-Warri and  Lagos-Ibadan railway projects, as well as the extension of the Lagos-Ibadan-Port Harcourt rail line. Notably, his government completed the Second Niger Bridge and the Lekki Deep Seaport.

Fatalities from Boko Haram reduced by 92 per cent, from 2,131 deaths in 2015 to 178 in 2021. Under the same administration, over a million Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) were resettled, and 13,000+ hostages, including some Chibok and Dapchi schoolgirls, regained freedom. The same government acquired 38 new aircraft and Nigeria’s first military satellite (Delsat-1).

In 2021, the Buhari government signed the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA), restructuring the Nigerian National Petroleum Commission (NNPC) into a commercial entity and setting the stage for significant transformation in the country’s oil and gas sector.

Confronting the past may be the path forward

The passing of a president demands more than mere remembrance or the crafting of political narratives. It should create an opportunity for national reflection. As Nigeria faces fresh challenges of insecurity, displacement, and regional strife, Buhari’s legacy presents both insights and cautions. 

As official tributes accumulate, Nigerians reflect not only on what Buhari accomplished but also on what remains incomplete.