Displaced People with Disabilities Face Severe Struggles in Borno Camps

About an hour after dawn, Kaka Adam, 45, braces for another day of struggle. He sits quietly outside his small rented room in Bama, Borno State, northeastern Nigeria. His single wheelchair, an indispensable and worn-out device he shares with his two wives, rests beside him. The morning is still, but his mind is already pacing. 

He has to go to the hand pump borehole, half a kilometre from his home, to fetch water for the day.

Four years ago, Kaka left the Government Senior Science Secondary School Internally Displaced Persons (GSSSS IDP) camp in Bama, where he had taken refuge after Boko Haram militants overran his hometown, Goniri, in the same state. Though Bama was eventually declared safe for return, Goniri remains under the control of ISWAP/Boko Haram. For Kaka, returning home was out of the question, and life in the camp became unbearable.

But it wasn’t the trauma of war or the cramped tents that drove him out of the camp.

It was the toilets.

“The toilets were impossible for someone like me,” he said, frustration etched in his voice. “I had to crawl to access the latrine, and it was always filthy. My wives, who also have mobility challenges, suffer even more because they are always at home and doesn’t have access to open fields to relieve themselves during the day. We often wait till midnight to relieve ourselves in open fields, which are filled with faeces all the time.”

A study conducted in Ibadan, Oyo State, southwestern Nigeria, shows that 57 per cent of households in Nigeria use unsanitary facilities or are forced to defecate in the open, facing a serious risk of exposure to diseases such as cholera, typhoid, infectious hepatitis, and other sanitation-related illnesses.

People with disabilities face heightened challenges related to open defecation, including social stigma and serious safety risks, especially for women, who may limit defecation to nighttime to avoid public scrutiny, increasing their vulnerability to assault or accidents. Some are forced to use makeshift alternatives like polythene bags or potties, which are often dumped in unsafe places, contributing to the spread of infectious diseases.

Across northeastern Nigeria, the Boko Haram insurgency has displaced over two million people. Despite the provisions of Nigeria’s Discrimination Against Persons with Disabilities Act (2018), which mandates accessibility, people with disabilities have told HumAngle that internally displaced persons (IDP) camps remain hostile environments for them. Essential infrastructure in these camps is either absent or unusable for disabled individuals.

Kaka lost his mobility to polio four decades ago, but the challenges he faces in the displacement camp are more recent and relentless. The places meant to offer protection have forced people like him into deeper isolation.

According to the Minimum Standards for Camp Management, ensuring an inclusive environment is critical for upholding the rights and dignity of all displaced persons. In particular, the guidelines stress that all basic facilities—including toilets— must be designed, maintained, and upgraded with accessibility in mind for persons with disabilities.

Abba Kaka, Vice Chairperson of the Association of Persons with Disabilities in Bama, said that over 200 mobility-impaired IDPs have left the camp due to accessibility issues. HumAngle confirmed this claim during a visit to the camp, where we found that some individuals had indeed gone in search of better conditions.

But the struggle doesn’t end once people with disabilities leave the camps. Outside, they often face the same, if not worse, challenges. Those who rent homes often face hostility from other tenants over shared facilities, such as latrines. They are blamed when toilets are dirty, even when children misuse the shared facilities.

Before displacement, Kaka was a farmer and owned a provisions store in his village. “I never had to share latrines before,” he told HumAngle. “It was only in the IDP camp that I learned what it means to be humiliated just for needing a toilet.”

Now working as a blacksmith in Bama, Kaka employs two others with mobility impairments while supporting three wives and five children. Despite finding work, survival remains an uphill battle.

The struggles of mobility-impaired IDPs go beyond infrastructure; they are routinely excluded from humanitarian aid as leaving the camp means missing support for registered IDPs living inside, Kaka explained.

“When aid is distributed, we are often overlooked,” Kaka told HumAngle. “Officials tell us we don’t qualify because we no longer live in the camps. But even when aid is given outside the camps, community leaders ignore us.”

Unless an aid programme explicitly requires the inclusion of persons with disability, they are often ignored. “We are seen as a burden,” Kaka says. “That’s why many of us end up begging.”

Every day, Nigerians with disabilities are sidelined by their communities and workplaces, denied equitable access to healthcare, and subjected to verbal harassment. Such pervasive mistreatment fuels depression and curtails educational and economic opportunities.

Participation in public events is also challenging. Mohammad Abubakar, chairperson of the Association of People with Disabilities in Borno State, said that whenever they are invited to “inclusion programmes”, the irony becomes apparent and painful. 

“We can’t even use the restrooms. We avoid eating or drinking at such events and often leave halfway just to avoid the embarrassment,” he said. 

Unbearable for the disabled

At several IDP camps in Borno State, HumAngle observed inadequate hygiene facilities. Where ramps exist, they are often too steep, too narrow, or broken. Handrails are either missing or poorly installed. Latrines are cramped pit toilets, often without a water supply.

There are no separate latrines for people with disabilities. They are forced to share the same hygiene facilities as everyone else, which becomes unbearable for those with physical challenges, particularly for those who must crawl to access the facility. Water points are rarely available, and when present, they often malfunction.

Faced with these realities, many turn to open defecation, waiting until nightfall or travelling far from the camp just to relieve themselves in private. This practice contributes to rising public health issues, placing additional strain on the country’s healthcare system and increasing medical costs. It also facilitates the spread of waterborne diseases such as cholera, diarrhoea, and schistosomiasis, which are particularly prevalent in communities where open defecation is widespread.

Mohammad Ahmed, a Maiduguri-based civil engineer who has worked on sanitation projects for displaced communities, told HumAngle that the standard 80 by 120 centimetre toilet design simply does not accommodate a wheelchair. 

The only indication that the toilets are designed for people with disabilities is the presence of ramps and rails installed at the facility’s entrance, which are also not always accessible; the ramps are steep, the doors are narrow, and the door threshold blocks their movement.

‘Reach, enter, circulate, use’

Grema Goni, the disability inclusion coordinator for the Borno State chapter of the Joint National Association of Persons with Disabilities (JONAPWD), points to a widespread failure to implement fundamental accessibility principles. He used the acronym RECU — Reach, Enter, Circulate, Use — to describe what’s required for a facility to be truly accessible.

He explains that accessibility means eliminating obstacles to reaching a location, ensuring that there are rails and braille signs, that the construction allows easy entry, and that people with disabilities can freely move inside with their mobility aids. Lastly, the facilities should cater to the needs of people with disabilities, such as having water points at an accessible level and in a convenient location, and they should maintain proper hygiene.

“If one is missing, a person with a mobility disability will be challenged; they cannot access facilities built without the RECU in consideration,” he told HumAngle. 

Grema said public toilets and water points across Borno State routinely fail on all four counts. “If the water point is high, disabled people can’t use it. All the public toilets we have here are built without considering people with disabilities. The construction is just designed for people without disabilities,” he added.

For Goni and other advocates, these oversights highlight a deeper issue: the lack of inclusive thinking in public infrastructure throughout the state. 

Invisible at home, rejected in school

Disability in Borno State is not merely a structural challenge; it is a profoundly social one, often beginning within the home. Individuals with disabilities face stigma, compounded by poverty and shame.

Maryam Ismail, a mobility-impaired woman from Maiduguri, recalls growing up in an environment where families concealed their disabled children out of shame. “We are also human beings,” she said. “Yet we are treated as if our presence is an embarrassment.” 

Within households, parents would often keep their disabled children out of sight whenever visitors arrived. This invisibility at home frequently extends into the broader community. In parts of Maiduguri, children with disabilities are pushed into begging, rather than being nurtured or educated.

Maryam insists that parents must confront their biases and stop seeing disabled children as burdens or curses. 

“These children are not a curse,” she said.“They should be treated equally, not turned into street beggars.”

The stigma surrounding disability in Nigeria has profound social and psychological consequences. Negative attitudes, often rooted in cultural and religious beliefs, can lead to rejection, neglect, and a denial of self-worth for persons with disabilities. These experiences frequently result in low self-esteem, depression, and social isolation. Such stigma not only affects mental health but also reinforces barriers to accessing essential services like education, healthcare, and employment.

But access to opportunity remains elusive, especially in education. Hauwa Ali, who has a disability and lives in Jere Local Government Area, described her repeated attempts to enrol at a community school in Maiduguri. Each time, staff turned her away — not because of paperwork or fees, but because she was unable to climb the stairs. After three determined attempts, Hauwa took the matter to the principal, who finally granted her admission.

However, the newly built school was not designed with consideration for students like her. Her classroom is on the third floor, and she often climbs up once and remains there until the end of the school day. On other days, the sheer physical strain forces her to miss classes altogether.

Even when students with disabilities manage to enrol, the learning environment remains inhospitable. Hassana Mohammed Bunu, a student at the University of Maiduguri and the women’s leader of the Joint Association of Persons with Disabilities, Borno State chapter, said she endures daily pain to attend classes held on the upper floors. 

“They told me just to manage—that 30 minutes was enough to climb. No one asked if I could do it safely or how it affected my health,” she said. 

Hassana explained that marginalisation is even more pronounced for those with sensory impairments. She claims that there are no sign language interpreters for people with impaired hearing in any hospital across Borno State, forcing patients to rely on random gestures to communicate, which often leads to misdiagnosis. HumAngle was unable to independently verify this claim.

This mirrors national patterns. According to the World Federation of the Deaf, 76 per cent of hearing-impaired women in Nigeria report that they never receive public health information in the national sign language, while 57 per cent indicate that sign language interpreters are rarely present in healthcare facilities.

Without trained interpreters, hearing-impaired patients are often left to depend on family members or untrained staff, undermining their right to informed consent and putting their safety at risk. 

A law that exists only on paper

Nigeria’s Discrimination Against Persons with Disabilities (Prohibition) Act, 2018, mandates that all public buildings and facilities be accessible and prohibits discrimination in access to infrastructure. However, IDP camps remain in direct violation of this law.

Hassana told HumAngle that all attempts to engage the Borno State government to implement the Act have been unsuccessful.

Abubakar Hassan, a disability advocate, argues that accessibility must not be limited to IDP camps alone. “Toilets for disabled persons should be as common as male and female toilets. They should exist in schools, markets, camps, and parks,” he added. 

Despite the legal framework, government buildings remain inaccessible. “I had to drop out of school multiple times because the facilities were not designed for us,” Abubakar adds.

The plight of mobility-impaired IDPs in Northeast Nigeria is not just about broken ramps or filthy toilets. It reflects a systemic disregard for those who are already marginalised. Disability advocates are now calling for nationwide audits of public infrastructure, dedicated funding for accessible sanitation, and enforcement mechanisms to ensure compliance with the law. Without intervention, the promise of protection for Nigeria’s most vulnerable will remain hollow. 

However, HumAngle observed that some hygiene facilities constructed by both humanitarian organizations in general and the government consistently fail to meet the minimum standards required for persons with disabilities. HumAngle reached out to some of the organisations working in these areas and responsible for WASH facilities for comment on how they ensure people with disabilities are considered when interventions are made. 

Repeated efforts to reach organisations like UNICEF, UNHCR, and the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) have proven abortive as HumAngle did not receive any response. 

Plan International, a global humanitarian organisation, responded, however. The organisation says while it does not oversee camp facilities, it ensures all school toilets it constructs or rehabilitates are designed to be accessible to all learners, including children with disabilities, and align with inclusive WASH (Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene) minimum standards.

“Through communal ownership and sustainability pathways built into our projects, the latrines are taken care of by the community structure placed during the implementation,” said Emmanuel Nuhu, head of humanitarian programme.