North-East insurgency: 17,000 Nigerians still missing – ICRC
An estimated 17,000 Nigerians remain missing, primarily due to violence in the North-East and other conflict zones, according to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).
The organization provided this update on Wednesday in advance of the International Day of the Disappeared, observed annually on August 30. This year’s figure marks a decrease of approximately 6,000 from last year’s report, which indicated that 23,659 individuals were missing.
Emeline Montel, the Protection of Family Links Delegate at the ICRC’s Mubi office, disclosed that around 3,000 of the missing individuals are from Adamawa State. Montel emphasized that these figures are based on cases documented by the ICRC, which offers support to families seeking to locate missing loved ones.
Montel spoke to reporters during a public sanitation event in Yola, which included street cleaning and an awareness campaign organized by families of the missing and supported by the ICRC. Participants aimed to highlight the challenges faced by families impacted by the disappearances.
Relatives of missing persons expressed that the community cleanup effort also sought to draw attention to their plight. Many of those unaccounted for are described as breadwinners and young individuals who vanished while attempting to improve their lives.
Habiba Mustapha, a member of the Association of Families of Disappeared Persons, participated in the street cleaning campaign in Yola. She reported that the fate of four of her relatives remains unknown. Originally from Gwoza in Borno State, Mustapha has been displaced to Adamawa, where she shared the emotional and economic distress her family faces due to their disappearance.
“The disappearance of my relatives is a continuing source of emotional stress and economic difficulty,” Mustapha said. “Some of these missing persons were breadwinners. Our children are not going to school. Look at me here in a completely new environment.”
