Nigeria

Since 2014, Boko Haram has employed sexual violence as a weapon of war and used the kidnapping of young schoolgirls to propagate their extremist anti-western education rhetoric.

Many were abducted from schools, their homes, from farms and markets, and other public places. In captivity they were subjected to rape, forced marriages, forced pregnancies, sexual slavery, and other forms of conflict-related sexual violence. The violence carried out by Boko Haram and its splinter group, Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP), has led to the death of more than 350,000 people, and the internal displacement of more than 3.6 million others.

After escaping or being rescued, the women and girls are seen as tainted and often referred to as “Boko Haram wives.” Their children (born to Boko Haram fighters) are cast off, not to be touched and not allowed to associate with other children, which has a devastating impact on their capacity to access education.

Project partners

Youth Initiative Against Terrorism (YIAT)

Neem Foundation

Future Resilience and Development Foundation FRAD

2022

WORK BEGAN

694

SURVIVOR PARTICIPANTS

3

LOCATIONS

To address the dire needs of survivors held in captivity, we partnered with the Youth Initiative Against Terrorism (YIAT) in July 2022 to develop an interim reparative measures project, co-created with survivors, in Adamawa and Yobe. The project began in December 2023, and includes compensation, with financial training, for livelihood projects supported by vocational skills training, education, and psychological and medical care. Survivors are also defining collective interim reparative measures.

A similar interim reparative measures project was launched with the Future Resilience and Development Foundation (FRAD) in Borno state, with almost 376 survivors identified since December 2024. The identification process is ongoing.

In both projects, GSF and partners work with community leaders and civil society organisations to create trust locally, and ensure survivors are safe, respected, and their right to privacy maintained.

Education as a form of reparation

Nigeria is also home to GSF’s pilot project on reparative education, tailored to children affected by conflict-related sexual violence and the Boko Haram insurgency.

The Neem Foundation is currently delivering trauma-responsive education to 120 children at the Lafiya Sarari school and private institutions. The programme provides flexible, values-based classes promoting acceptance, and accelerated learning programmes for both boys and girls across Borno state. Another 80 are expected to enrol in the autumn semester. The children, aged 8 to 14, include direct victims of the Boko Haram insurgency, children born of war, other children born to survivors, and children who witnessed the violence.

The project restores the value and possibilities provided by education which were explicitly and systematically targeted by Boko Haram.

I never thought I would be able to take care of myself or my child, but I have seen changes in my life. I even support my mum now, and I’m amazed at myself. I never imagined I would see this day—I’ve even enrolled my child in a private school.

— Survivor from Adamawa state, Nigeria

A new study on the way

Alongside the interim reparative measures projects, GSF also partnered with the development Research and Projects Centre to produce a Global Reparations Study for Nigeria. The study, which analyses the opportunities and challenges for reparation in Nigeria’s northeast, will be launched in 2025. It will provide insights from survivors on opportunities and hindrances to reparation access and show GSF’s interim reparative measures as a proof of concept for affordable and accessible reparation programmes.