The people of the Lake Chad Basin are grappling with one of Africa’s biggest humanitarian crises. Caused by the ravages of violent conflict, extreme poverty, underdevelopment and climate change, the crisis is affecting more than 17 million people across north eastern Nigeria, Cameroon’s Far North, western Chad and south eastern Niger.
More than 10.8 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance. Most of the 2.4 million displaced by the crisis - more than half of them children - are sheltering in communities who are among the poorest in the world.
Outside the town of Diffa, in the south eastern corner of Niger, the highway is dotted with makeshift settlements, shelters made of tree limbs, millet stalks and the occasional tarpaulin. These are the homes of some of the 340,000 people displaced by the crisis, both from within Niger and from neighbouring Nigeria, who have arrived in Diffa in search of food and, most of all, safety.
Theirs are stories of displacement, dislocation and disintegration.
CARE is assisting more than 300,000 people currently seeking refuge in Diffa, working with local partners to provide hygiene and shelter kits, build latrines and boreholes, and distribute cash, food, seeds and agricultural equipment and small scale livestock such as goats and sheep.
But aid agencies across the region are struggling to meet the needs of so many displaced. This is one of Africa’s most underreported crises.
