ICC Note

Nigerian refugees in Cameroon, displaced from their homes by Boko Haram, claim that their government has abandoned them. Over 200,000 Nigerian refugees are residing in Cameroon, Chad and Niger, in camps that often have horrible living conditions and very little food. In a video created by the refugees, they beg their government to remember them. They want to return home and work rather than continue to live off humanitarian aid that cannot provide adequate amounts of food. Boko Haram violence against Christians has led many of them to end up in refugee camps, the fact that they would want to return home shows how dire conditions are in these camps.

06/01/2017 Nigeria (Vanguard) – Tens of thousands of Nigerian refugees in Cameroon have decried their living conditions in camps in Cameroon, lamenting that the federal government has abandoned them.

The refugees said they would rather return home to engage in economic activities that would guarantee their survival than continue to depend on humanitarian gestures to survive.

Wondering whether federal government had not forgotten them, the refugees, who were displaced from their homelands in the insurgency-ravaged North East, said their food ration had been drastically reduced.

“Hunger is the reason we left Nigeria after Boko Haram chased us from our homes. We are very hungry here. The quantity of food usually given to us has been greatly reduced. We want to ask; are we no longer Nigerians? ‘’Has Nigeria forgotten us? We want to come back and stay on our own soil and work, even without food,” said the refugees in a video message.

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