HumAngle's Human Rights Desk examines gross human rights violations such as extra-judicial killings, enforced disappearances, and arbitrary arrests/detention. It also covers issues surrounding press freedom and monitors reports and activities of human rights organisations.
It was at 11:21 a.m. on Sunday, June 21, that things started to fall apart. Aliyu Muhammad was in the Malali area, Kaduna, northwestern Nigeria, working underneath a car when he missed a call from his wife. When he called back, someone else answered and asked him if he knew the owner of the phone. …
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Fatima ‘Teema’ Mahmud uploaded a short clip on her Telegram Status that morning; it showed a leaked intimate video involving individuals in northern Nigeria. The time was 8:13 a.m.; minutes later, she uploaded another one and another. By midday, she had uploaded dozens of similar pieces of content. By evening, there were hundreds. Some of …
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With ₦2.759 million standing between Pious Umokoro* and graduation, his dream of building a better life for himself hangs in the balance. The chance to attend a private university felt like a blessing, but four years of relentless effort, sleepless nights, and hope are at risk if he cannot secure the funds. Given his family’s …
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“Officer, abeg! I go tell you everything. Na my friend na him deceive me. E de Sapele, I go carry you go the place. I no know anything concern. Officer!” These were the last words of 28-year-old Oghenemine Ogidi before he was shot at close range by Usman Nuhu, an Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP), …
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Let us begin with what has been forgotten. There is a field, roughly 22 kilometres southwest of Sokoto, between the Dange Shuni and Bodinga local government areas in North West Nigeria, that carries no particular weight to the eye. Grass grows there. Wind moves through trees at predictable intervals. The surrounding bush is in full …
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Aichatou often heard of insecurity for most of her life, but never experienced it herself. She had relatives who had either been killed or displaced in places like Bosso, a village close to Lake Chad that was ravaged by Boko Haram insurgency in 2015. But the violence that festered along the Sokoto and Kebbi flanks …
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When he became Nigeria’s Inspector-General of Police (IGP) in 2023, Kayode Egbetokun vowed to fight criminality and insecurity with vim and vigour. He seemed determined to reform the police; he promised to improve officers’ welfare and make Nigeria a safer, better country for its people. As Usman Alkali stepped out of the IGP office and …
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Blessing William crouched by the stream in Bole-3 at dawn, scrubbing pots and dishes. The water surface had a milky tint, and a faint aftertaste lingered each time she drank from it. Still, this remains the only source of flowing water for her family and the wider community. As a child, the 30-year-old mother of …
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Saturday, Dec. 13, 2025, was meant to be a pivotal civic exercise across Borno State, northeastern Nigeria, as residents were expected to elect chairpersons and councillors responsible for local development, basic services, and community representation. Instead, what unfolded across parts of the state bore little resemblance to a functioning democratic process. Umar Ali, a resident …
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Fatima Alhassan is 20 years old now, but her voice still carries the weight of a ten-year-old girl who watched her world collapse a decade ago. Her father, Shahid Alhassan, was killed on Dec. 12, 2015, during the infamous Zaria Massacre. “Despite our little time with him, we were always happy around him,” she said. …
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Bilkisu Haruna’s* voice carried over 25 years of frustration, rising through the phone. Her life, which she expected to change when she got a job at Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), Zaria, Kaduna State, in northwestern Nigeria, in the early 2000s, after years of menial labour, was swallowed into an endless pit of suffering and bitterness. …
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Ruya Auta, the Nigerian police officer who shot and killed 20-year-old Rinji Bala on May 13, 2020, has been sentenced to death by hanging or lethal injection. The sentence was delivered at a High Court in Jos, Plateau State, in North Central Nigeria, on Monday, Dec. 8. Ruya was attached to Operation Safe Haven (now …
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