DAMASAK, Nigeria — When Boko Haram began an insurgency in northeastern Nigeria in 2010, Abdulhameed Salisu packed his bags and fled his hometown of Damasak in devastated Borno state.
The 45-year-old father of seven returned with his family early last year. They are moving from concentration camps to their villages and homelands, or newly built homes known as “host communities”, under a hasty resettlement program to suggest the conflict with Islamic extremists is almost over. He is among the thousands of Nigerians brought back to their villages.
Dozens of displacement camps have been closed across Borno, with authorities claiming they are no longer needed and most of the places where displaced people have taken shelter are now safe.
But many of the displaced say it is not safe to return.
Boko Haram, Nigeria’s homegrown jihadists, took up arms in 2009 to fight Western education and impose radical Islamic law, or sharia. The conflict is now Africa’s longest-running armed conflict and has spilled over into Nigeria’s northern neighbor.
Some 35,000 civilians have been killed and more than 2 million displaced in the northeast, according to United Nations figures. In 2014, the abduction of 276 schoolgirls by Boko Haram from Chibok village in Borno state, the epicenter of the conflict, shocked the world.
Nearly 900,000 internally displaced persons are held in concentration camps in Borno state alone, and many others have been integrated into local communities. At least 1,600 civilians have been killed in militant attacks in Borno state so far this year, according to the U.S.-based nonprofit Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project.
And in the state, where at least 70% of the population depends on agriculture, dozens of farmers were killed or abducted from their fields by militants last year.
In May, the military announced that hundreds of hostages, mostly women and children, held captive by Boko Haram for months or years had been rescued from a forest enclave and handed over to authorities.
In September, at least 100 villagers were killed by suspected Boko Haram militants who opened fire on markets, worshipers, and homes in Tarmuwa parliamentary area in neighboring Yobe state, west of Borno.
Analysts say forced displacement could put local residents at risk as security remains inadequate in hard-hit areas.
Salisu says he is wasting his days at a resettlement camp in Damasak, a garrison town of about 200,000 people in Borno state near the border with Niger.
Food has become increasingly difficult to obtain, and Saris relies on aid from the World Food Program and other aid organizations. He is anxious to find a job.
“We are pleading with the government to at least find a means of livelihood instead of doing nothing and waiting for food to arrive,” he said.
During a visit to Damasac last week, WFP Executive Director Cindy McCain called for more funding to support the agency’s aid efforts and vowed that the world would not abandon Nigerians.
“We’re going to stay here and do the best we can to end hunger,” McCain told The Associated Press, acknowledging the lack of funding. “How do you take food from the hungry and give it to the starving?” she said.
Resettlement typically involves taking displaced people back to their villages or “host communities” in military trucks. The Borno State government, with support from aid organizations, has promised to provide returnees with essential supplies to help them integrate into these areas.
The government says concentration camps are no longer sustainable.
Borno State Governor Babagana Zulum told McCain during the visit: “What we need now…is a durable solution.”
As resettlement progressed, one in five displaced people remained in the Borno state capital Maiduguri and nearby towns, but received no support for regional integration or the Global Protection Cluster, a network of non-governmental organizations and United Nations agencies. I was left behind. he said last December.
Many others have crossed the border north and settled as refugees in neighboring Niger, Chad and Cameroon. The three countries have registered at least 52,000 Nigerian refugees since January 2023, nearly double the number registered in the previous 22 months, according to the United Nations refugee agency. are.
Hasty closures and forced resettlement of displaced persons camps may again put displaced people at risk from extremists still active in their homelands or “make deals” with jihadists to enable farming and fishing. ‘, the International Crisis Group warned. Report from the beginning of this year.
This could lead to extremists strengthening their presence in these areas, the group warned. Boko Haram, which split into two major factions in 2016, continues to ambush security forces and attack villages.
Abubakar Kau Monguno, director of the Disaster Risk Management Center at the University of Maiduguri, said the best option is for government forces to step up operations to eliminate the insurgents or “force them to surrender”.
Some farmers in Damasak and other parts of Mobar district, whose farms were inaccessible due to repeated attacks by militants, returned to work last year with seedlings provided by the government.
Saris was one of them.
Then, in September, a major flood occurred, causing an important dam to burst and about 40% of Maiduguri’s territory to be submerged under water. Officials said 30 people were killed and more than 1 million people were affected.
Farms that supplied the state with food were destroyed, including Saris’ farm. Hopes for a bumper rice harvest were dashed. He is now queuing to buy food at the Damasak food hub.
“Since Boko Haram started, everything else has stopped here. There is nothing on the ground, no jobs,” he said.
Maryam Abdullahi and other women lined up at the WFP base in Damasak, waiting for bags of rice and other groceries desperately needed for her family of eight. Her youngest child is 6 years old.
The donations will only last until the middle of the month, but she said she was still waiting in the scorching heat.
She uses what little money she has to buy yams for frying and sells them to feed her family, but it’s still not enough. Her only wish, she said, is to get a “proper job” so she and her children can feel safe.
“We either eat it in the morning to fuel us for the rest of the day, or we only eat it at night,” Abdullahi said.
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Associated Press writer Haruna Umar in Maiduguri, Nigeria, contributed to this report. Contributed.
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