Diffa: the new frontier

UNICEF Niger/ Islamane Abdou
Koussou and Fanta, both 14, come from Assaga, a village attacked by Boko Haram. Assaga was once separated by the Komadougou river. Koussou lived on the Nigeria side and Fanta on the Niger side. Now the whole community of Assaga moved to safety along the route nationale 1.

By Charlotte Arnaud, UNICEF Niger,12 April 2016

Did you know that the word Sahel comes from Arabic and literally means side or frontier? I didn’t until recently. Or at least I didn’t truly understand the meaning of this word. You see, in the Sahel, frontiers are sometimes more a conceptual construction than a reality for most people.

People living at the border with Nigeria considers Nigerians as their brothers. The only thing separating them is the Komadougou River, a geographical barrier symbolizing the very concept of sides. So when the conflict in Northern Nigeria broke and forced hundreds of thousands to cross the river to find safety in Niger, they were welcomed like long lost cousins and new friendships were made.

I met Koussou and Fanta just 10 kilometres from Diffa city, in southeast Niger. Before the attack on their villages (named Assaga) they were both living at the border. Koussou was living in Assaga Nigeria, the south side of the Komadougou River and Fanta was living in Assaga Niger, north side of the River.

Uprooted by Boko Haram, they now both live on separate sides of the Route Nationale 1, the main east-west highway across Niger, now a new frontier between Nigerian refugees and Niger’s displaced. Even more unsettling, their spontaneous site, one of more of 135 of this kind, is also named Assaga, after the name of their original villages. With the road as their new separating river, a certain familiarity in this new life is teleported less than 20 kilometres away from the border.

For more information go to :
https://blogs.unicef.org/blog/diffa-the-new-frontier/

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