On a breezy morning at the height of the dry season six months ago, Rifkatu Andruwus and her children were chatting in front of their house in a displacement camp in the heart of Nigeria's capital. Suddenly, security forces stormed into the camp, followed closely by bulldozers.
The Durumi camp for the displaced in Abuja, Nigeria's capital, had been home for Andruwus since her family fled the fighting 10 years ago between Nigerian security forces and Islamic extremists in the country's northeast. Slums and shantytowns are often targeted in rampant demolitions across Africa's most populous country, and especially in Abuja. The government has defended the actions as a sustained effort to restore the city's master plan -- a conceptual layout meant to promote growth in this oil-rich Western African nation.
Almost two-thirds of Nigerians live in poverty and the country also struggles with record unemployment. The World Bank says as many as 46% of the nation's more than 200 million people do not have access to electricity. He said Nigerian authorities often use the issue of illegal drugs and insecurity as an excuse for the evictions.
Though it housed more than 2,000 displaced persons, the improvised camp had not received any aid from the government in recent years, surviving only on food items and medicines donated by aid groups and benefactors, according to Ibrahim Ahmadu, who acts as the camp's chairman and now helps to mobilize resources for the homeless.