Thousands of displaced people in Katsina State have three things in common: they are defeated, scattered and helpless. Some of them turned to beggars, and those who swore against begging are slowly starving to death.
Sometime in March 2022, about a hundred of them loitering in Katsina’s government restricted area (GRA) fought over food and naira notes a compassionate pedestrian gave them, narrated Murtala Muhamamd, an eyewitness and resident of Katsina. The strong marched the weak while struggling to overshadow co-beggars. When the stampede ended, four of them had already suffocated to death and some severely injured were saved by a nearby hospital.
“Those who lived returned the following day,” revealed Muhammad. “Because they had nowhere else to turn to.”
Due to the rising banditry in Nigeria’s northwest region, residents of Katsina, the capital of Katsina State, are forced to welcome the displaced people trooping into the city from every corner of the state. They areeverywhere, and they are nicknamed ‘Al-Muhajirun’, an Arabic term used for the Muslim Prophet’s companions who emigrated Makkah to escape persecution.
Two years after he escaped bandit persecution in his village, he said he did not enjoy the luxury of sleeping under a roof. He secured a shelter near Shinkafi, an area located on the outskirts of Katsina city, but the squalid uncompleted building overpopulated with other IDPs barely created a breathing space for his two wives and nineteen children.
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