Nigeria

Young Nigerians protesting against police brutality at lekki Tollgate. Credit: Alucardion, shutterstock

PRAWA believes in the importance of an effective, just, humane and accessible justice system which recognises support and rehabilitation to offenders, victims and the community. The organisation has implemented extensive activities in the field of correctional centers and penal reforms as well as several innovative correctional centers-based and community-based programmes.

Torture and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment won’t end until we all say it must. Watch how a Nigerian NGO engages young people, the leaders of tomorrow, across the country, from classrooms to radio studios, raising their voices to speak out against torture.

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Based in Nigeria’s capital Abuja, Legend Golden Care Foundation (LGCF) implemented a livelihoods project reaching 50 survivors – including 21 survivors of torture and other ill-treatment by police against the August 2024 #EndBadGovernance protesters, and 29 residents of the Wassa displaced persons camp. All participants had previously completed trauma-informed rehabilitation and expressed a strong desire to enhance their economic situation.

The project provided vocational training, entrepreneurship and financial literacy, psychosocial support, and start-up assistance. Survivors developed skills in tailoring, baking, hairdressing, and soap production, launched small businesses with start-up kits and seed funding, and received mentorship to support growth and market access. a strong desire to enhance their economic situation.

After six months, 23 survivors reported consistent income growth, some earning above NGN 3,000 daily (EUR 2), above the minimum wage, while psychosocial support improved coping skills, self esteem, and community cohesion.

The results of the project was recorded by the clinical psychologist following LGCF’s group therapy sessions:

Apart from a series of psychological group therapy sessions, LGCF offered training sessions in customer service, digital marketing and pricing strategies.

In LGCF’s livelihoods project in Nigeria, 29 survivors were trained in tailoring to produce shirts, skirts, gowns, trousers and school uniforms. Credit: LGCF

After six months, 23 survivors reported consistent income growth while psychosocial support improved coping skills, self esteem, and community cohesion. Credit: LGCF

From the project Legend Golden Care Foundation (LGCF) have compiled a list of the most important lessons they learned:

• Holistic Support is Crucial: We learned that providing only vocational skills training is insufficient. The combination of psychosocial support, financial literacy, and mentorship was essential for the beneficiaries’ overall success. Addressing trauma and building emotional resilience were just as important as teaching them a trade.

• Flexibility is Key: A rigid programme schedule is a significant barrier for beneficiaries with existing responsibilities. The project’s flexibility in scheduling within the project timeline and providing transportation stipends directly contributed to improved attendance and retention rates.

• Digital Skills are a Necessity: The immediate need for digital marketing skills highlighted a gap in our initial plan. The rapid shift to social media training proved that in today’s market, traditional vocational skills must be complemented by digital literacy to ensure business viability.

• Mentorship is Transformative: The one-on-one mentorship component was not just a support mechanism but a transformative element. It provided personalized guidance that a classroom setting could not replicate, building confidence and problem-solving skills in real-time.

Based in Nigeria’s capital Abuja, LGCF implemented a livelihoods project reaching 50 survivors. Credit: LGCF

Nigeria’s security forces have been in crisis for a decade, battling Islamists in the north, separatists and oil militias in the south, and a wave of organised crime. Amid the chaos, the State’s Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) became notorious for torturing citizens with complete impunity, leading to a wave of mass protests across the country, that were met with more police violence, torture and extrajudicial killings.

Amid the national outrage, PRAWA played a leading role in convincing the Nigerian government to disband the unit in 2020 and retrain its officers. The National Human Rights Commission subsequently set up independent Investigative Panels, at both state and federal level, to gather evidence of torture and ill-treatment and other human rights violations committed by SARS.

PRAWA’s director was appointed as a member of the federal investigative panel. IRCT and PRAWA provided several online trainings to both sets of panels on how to engage effectively and respectfully with victims, how to collect and assess evidence of torture using the Istanbul Protocol and how to determine and award meaningful reparations. As a result of the trainings, the IRCT was requested to provide technical support to the federal and state-level panels responsible for investigating and issuing recommendations for reparation, accountability and prevention. The Investigative Panels are now finishing their work and IRCT is analysing the evidence gathered.

The ECOWAS Court in Abuja, Nigeria, has ruled that psychological distress from witnessing the Lekki Tollgate massacre amounted to torture, ordering compensation for three survivors based on IFEG’s medico-legal evidence.

On 10 July 2024, the Community Court of Justice of ECOWAS in Abuja ruled that psychological distress and fear experienced by witnesses to the Lekki Tollgate massacre in Lagos amounted to torture, holding the Nigerian government responsible.

The case was supported by medico-legal reports produced by IFEG in collaboration with Nigerian NGO Gavel, documenting the physical and psychological impacts on three petitioners. Although the survivors were not physically harmed, the Court recognised the psychological terror and subsequent harassment they endured, which led to isolation and devastation of their social and familial networks.

The ruling marked a strategic victory for survivors, as the Court ordered Nigeria to pay each of the three applicants ten million Nigerian Naira (about EUR6,000), including compensation for the violation of the prohibition of torture, which is about twice the average annual income in the country.

Report published on the decisions rendered by the Independent Investigative Panel (IIP) on extra-judicial killings and enforced disappearances committed by SARS.

In 2024, IRCT and PRAWA, along with the National Human Rights Commission released a landmark report detailing the findings of the Independent Investigative Panel (IIP) on extrajudicial killings and enforced disappear-ances by Nigeria’s Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS), a unit notorious for torturing hundreds of Nigerians with near total impunity for a decade.

After the Lekki Tollgate massacre in October 2020, which spurred widespread protests, SARS was disbanded and the IIP was set up to investigate its crimes.

report on the decisions rendered by the Independent Investigative Panel (IIP) on extrajudicial killings and enforced disappearances committed by SARS.

Watch the film detailing how IRCT Member Centre, Prawa, played a leading role in convincing the government of nigeria to dispand the SARS police unit and to retrain its officers.

Nigeria ratified the UN Convention Against Torture in 2001. But for two decades, the country refused to be reviewed on its implementation of the Convention by the treaty monitoring body, the Committee Against Torture. In November 2021, the Committee went ahead anyway, and IRCT’s member in Nigeria, Prisoners Rehabilitation and Welfare Action (PRAWA), was there. So, for the first time, were Nigerian officials.

Nigeria did not submit a report to the Committee, but the Nigerian officials did answer the Committee’s questions. Although torture is prohibited under Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution and the 2017 Anti-Torture Act, the Nigerian officials recognised legal gaps remained. The Criminal Justice Act, Correctional Services Act and prison and police reform were given as examples of Nigeria strengthening its torture prevention policies.

Supported by the IRCT’s Advocacy Director, PRAWA led the production of the civil society report submitted to the Committee which, among other things, called for the government to include rehabilitation of torture survivors as a policy under the Anti-Torture Act. That advocacy paid dividends: Paragraph 36 of the Committee’s Concluding Observations included just that recommendation. The Committee also noted nearly 30,000 complaints of torture and ill treatment between 2019 and 2020 had not been adequately investigated and urged Nigeria to end “an environment of impunity”. Two members of PRAWA attended the two-days of hearings in Geneva.

Hear from Abosede Omowumi Babatunde, Senior Lecturer, University of Ilorin, Nigeria on her research and paper on ‘The Efficacy of Traditional Practices in Rehabilitating Victims of Torture in Nigeria.’