Young Nigerian Women Want To Go Into Politics – Party Rules And Older Men Keep Them Out

Women and young people are grossly underrepresented in Nigeria’s politics. Fatima Yusuf/Pexels

BY OMOMAYOWA OLAWALE ABATI

SENIOR RESEARCH OFFICER,

UNIVERSITY OF ESSEX

Nigerians will return to the polls in 2027. Campaigns will commence, crowds will fill the streets for party rallies, but the most consequential decisions about the elections are already happening. They are taking place in party offices, at the homes of powerful political godfathers, and in selection processes that most Nigerians never attend and sometimes don’t hear about.

This is where the most vulnerable group, young women, lose. Nearly half of Nigeria’s population is female and more than 70% is younger than 30 years. Yet women and young people continue to be grossly underrepresented in the country’s politics. Nationally, 6.7% of elected positions and appointments are occupied by women. The global average is 22.5% and Africa’s is 23.4%.

Those who want to contest for elective offices signify their interest at their wards, where they must secure support before going to the local governments or senatorial zones or states. This depends on the offices they want to vie for.

Two changes have been made in the past 10 years to address the underrepresentation of women and young people. The first was the 2018 Age Reduction Law, also known as Not Too Young to Run. It lowered the minimum candidacy age to 25 for State Houses of Assembly and the House of Representatives. Then in 2022 the country’s two dominant parties, the All Progressives Congress (APC) and Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), announced fee waivers for women and a 50% discount for young aspirants. These are fees paid to political parties to purchase nomination forms.

But these changes have failed to shift the dial. Only two young women (aged under 30) won seats across Nigeria’s 36 state assemblies in the 2023 elections. Women aged between 30 and 35 managed to secure three seats in 2019 and 2023 state assembly elections. At the national level, the youngest women are in their 40s.

Our initial research as political scientists found that dominant political parties nominate only a few young (male and female) candidates. Minor parties field the highest numbers of young candidates.

In follow-up research, we studied the reason for this: examining how formal rules and informal norms of parties interact to shape the political candidacy of young women in Nigeria.

The research included 40 interviews with party leaders and candidates in the All Progressives Congress and the Peoples Democratic Party. We asked candidates about party selection practices and the roles of gatekeepers, money and godfathers, and how they navigate the party selection process. We asked party leaders about their statutory and non-statutory roles in selecting party candidates and what they perceived of young party aspirants.

What we found

We found that in Nigeria’s two dominant political parties, young women aspirants face a range of age- and gender-biased challenges.

These play out in:

visits to party elders, who are mostly elderly men, who hold the reins of power in these parties. While these visits are not obligatory, they are necessary in Nigeria to secure the support of the party elders

ancestral-lineage scrutiny, where the right of married young women to contest for political offices in their father’s and husband’s state of origin is questioned by senior male party members

“godfather networks” – sponsors of candidates, usually those with money to finance campaigns

financial barriers, where aspirants are not only expected to be up-to-date in payment of membership dues but are required to sponsor party events.

Our findings show that gender and youth disadvantage are reinforced through informal practices of parties. Our findings also expose why quotas or fee waivers can’t fix a system where the real gate-keeping happens in the shadows of internal party politics.

What’s not changed

Nigeria’s new Electoral Act 2026 abolished indirect primaries. This was a delegate convention system that gave party elites their most reliable tool for controlling outcomes. Previously, aspirants were informally expected to have sponsored delegates into party positions years in advance. Such positions are party offices at the ward, local government and state levels. These delegates will then vote during the indirect primaries.

One young male aspirant in Kwara told us he had facilitated key delegates’ emergence in 2015, “so in 2019, when the time came to lobby them, it was effortless”. No young woman we interviewed had built the same network. That particular mechanism is now unlawful.

With Section 87(2) also requiring that failed consensus on candidates’ selections must revert to direct primaries, not back-room elite bargaining, the law has narrowed some space for manipulation. The consensus option is where there are no primaries and candidates emerge by affirmation.

But three critical gaps remain.

First, Section 86 removes the detailed statutory procedures that previously governed direct primaries, including ward-level voting, equal opportunity for aspirants, and participation of all registered members, replacing them with a requirement that primaries follow “party guidelines”. The parties that have consistently excluded young women are now writing the rules of their own primaries.

Second, the 2026 Electoral Act introduces no cap on party nomination fees. The APC’s state assembly nomination form, which cost 2 million naira (US$1,465) in 2023, then a 135% increase from 2019, now costs 6 million naira (US$4,396), a 200% increase from the last election. This is not an electoral cost. It is a filter. The new law leaves it entirely unregulated.

Third, Sections 83(5) and (6) bar courts from hearing internal party matters. It means young women can’t challenge unlawful exclusion.

Moving forward

Other gaps remain ahead of 2027 elections:

a statutory cap on nomination fees, enforced by the Independent National Electoral Commission

enforceable youth-gender quotas at the candidate selection stage.

This would compel major parties to field young women in competitive seats, not merely posts under affirmative action.

These reforms would reduce the need for young politicians to solicit the support of powerful men. The question is whether the political will exists to change the rules.

Under-representation is not a supply problem. The evidence from 2023 shows young Nigerian women with political ambition came forward in large numbers. The bottleneck is demand, and what parties choose to do with them once they arrive.

Mayowa Adeniji contributed to the research on which this article is based.

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Nigeria’s Conflict Zones: Why People Stay Even When They Can Leave

Benue, in Nigeria’s north central region. Photo by Ufoma Ojo on Unsplash

BY EZENWA E. OLUMBA

LEVERHULME EARLY CAREER RESEARCH

FELLOW, ASTON UNIERSITY

When armed groups attack a community, people often assume that everyone who can escape will leave. This belief influences news stories, public discussions and humanitarian efforts, which usually focus on those who have been forced to move.

However, while I was doing research in north-central Nigeria, also called the Middle Belt, I came across some communities that had the means to flee to safety but decided to remain, even though they faced repeated violent attacks from armed nomadic herders and got little or no help from the government.

I have been studying why people move or stay, and the violent conflicts between farming communities and nomadic herders in the Middle Belt, since 2018. I have published several studies on these issues. My research examines the history of the conflicts, what causes them to escalate, and why some people choose to remain in conflict zones. I have also studied how memories of people, places and past experiences influence decisions to remain.

In one study, my co-authors and I use the term eco-violence to describe conflicts over land and water between farming communities and nomadic herders across the dry Sahel region. These conflicts are driven partly by pressures on land and water, discrimination, and failures of government, as herders move with their livestock in search of grazing and water.

Studies show that in many crisis situations, more people stay than leave. To better understand migration and conflict, we need to ask not just why people run away, but also why some remain.

One reason is that they fear losing their ancestral land and traditional way of life.
The study

In Nigeria’s Middle Belt, communities have faced violence and the loss of homes, farms and food stores for many years.

Thousands of people are killed every year, with many communities destroyed and others deserted. According to Amnesty International, over 6,896 people were killed between May 2023 and May 2025 in Benue state alone.

These rural communities receive little or no protection from the police or military. Sometimes, attackers even warn the communities ahead of time, but the police or military still do not step in to protect them.

Hardly a week that goes without a killing in Benue, Plateau or Nasarawa states in Nigeria.

In 2022, I spoke with 54 people living in Benue and Nasarawa states. In Benue, I spoke with people who were indigenous to the location, as well as people who had fled to nearby communities. In Nasarawa State, I spoke with members of a community who had been displaced but later returned after regaining control of their village.

Why ancestral land matters

Their two main reasons for staying emerged from the research, which has since been published in Mobilities.

The first was their attachment to their ancestral land and the resources it provides. Many people in the Middle Belt are farmers who cultivate land inherited through generations. The same land contains their family homes, burial grounds and sacred sites, and provides the setting for rituals and traditional festivals.

The Middle Belt is known for its fertile land. Benue State, for instance, is often described as the country’s “food basket” because much of the food grown there is supplied to other parts of Nigeria.

The second was their desire to preserve a familiar way of life that makes living meaningful to them. For these communities, home is made up of relationships, memories, traditions and identities passed from one generation to the next. Some of them put it simply: they would rather die than leave.

One of the community members said this:

This land is where I was born, and this is my father’s land. Wherever I run to, I will become a stranger and may become destitute … If I die in my house for what belongs to me, let me die. This is why I did not flee.

Their decision is not simply about whether they could survive elsewhere. It is mostly about preserving their traditional way of life, since life away from their ancestral land may no longer feel meaningful.

These communities believe they can only keep their way of life by staying on what they call their “father’s land”. Leaving would mean surrendering their land, livelihoods and communal life to live elsewhere with little or nothing.

One of the community members said:

Another factor is that the area where we are settled now belongs to our forefathers, and if we flee and abandon this place, where are we heading to? … [S]ince this is our land, we must live on it.

Remaining does not mean that they prefer violence. They know the dangers and fear further attacks. Many have lost relatives and friends. But leaving would mean losing a way of life they believe they cannot rebuild anywhere else.

Conflict is not the only thing people fear

Understanding this can help scholars, policymakers, journalists and humanitarian groups to work more thoughtfully with people who choose to remain in conflict, for whom leaving may carry losses they consider impossible to replace.

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Nigeria’s Federal Police Force Has Failed, But What Does History Say About Local Forces?

The Dogarai police system was reformed in 1907 to become the Native Authority Police Force. Wikimedia Commons

BY SAHEED BALOGUN AMUSA

PROFESSOR OF HISTORY, OBAFEMI

AWOLOWO UNIVERSITY

The Nigerian Senate passed a bill on 24 June 2026 establishing state police in the 36 states of the country. The passage of the executive bill, sent to the National Assembly by President Bola Tinubu, officially opens the way to dismantle the decades-old structure of the Nigeria Police Force and replace it with a dual model, comprising the Federal Police Service and State Police Services. Saheed Balogun Amusa, a police historian, explains that Nigeria had regional police before a central police force. He sets out what went wrong with those formations and the lessons they offer.

What was Nigeria’s regional policing system?

Nigeria used to have a federal Nigeria Police Force, established in 1930, a Native Authority Police Force in the northern region and a Local Government Police Force in the western region.

Only the eastern region did not have a regional police force, most likely because pre-colonial Igboland and other communities in the area did not have a policing system. In northern Nigeria, the pre-colonial Dogarai police system was reformed in 1907 to become the Native Authority Police Force. In western Nigeria, various police systems in Yorubaland were reformed into the Local Government Police Force during the colonial era.

These regional forces were controlled and funded by the regional governments. They were abolished in 1968 and their personnel recruited to the Nigeria Police Force. While regional police then were closer to the citizens, hence effective, they were also susceptible to control and influence by the ruling political elites.

Your research showed that the federal police were not insulated from political influence during the 1962 Action Group crisis. Are federal police good for Nigeria?

Whether federal or state police, they are agents of governments that control and fund them. However, operating a single police system in Nigeria gave the federal government the power to undermine the powers of state governors who should be the chief security officers of their states. It also reduced the effectiveness of the police in local environments.

In my view as a police historian, federal police are instruments of political attainment and consolidation. They are used, in some instances, to gain and keep political power. They are also instruments of political harassment and intimidation of the state and local governments.

The 1962 Action Group crisis was a result of ideological conflicts among the leaders of Action Group, the ruling party in the western region from the 1950s to 1965. The 1962 riot within the chamber and premises of the western region House of Assembly in Ibadan led to the declaration of a state of emergency in the region from May 1962 to January 1963. The supporters of Obafemi Awolowo, then federal opposition leader, accused the federal police of protecting the interests of the Akintola-led government. They also alleged that the prime minister, Tafawa Balewa, denied them police protection.

Other instances include the role of the Nigeria Police Force in the 1953 Kano riots, the 1959 federal elections and the recurring Tiv riots of the 1960s. The 1965 western regional elections and the 1983 general elections were others. The federal government in these instances used the police to suppress the citizens.

To give some more recent examples: A former governor of Anambra State, Chris Ngige, was abducted by policemen led by an assistant inspector-general, Raphael Ngige, in July 2003. The then inspector-general, Tafa Balogun, later ordered his release. Similarly in 2013, during a feud between Rivers State governor Rotimi Amaechi and then president Goodluck Jonathan, Amaechi and his entourage were teargassed and physically blocked from entering the Government House in Port Harcourt by federal police. In 2023, heavily armed police officers fired teargas and water cannons at Governor Siminalayi Fubara outside the Rivers State House of Assembly complex.

How could state police in Nigeria succeed, in your view?

Political influence cannot be ruled out in any government institution. Globally, there have been accusations of political manipulations of police and other security agencies at all levels. However, this does not mean that police everywhere are agents or instruments of political intimidation.

A country like Nigeria that is trying to experiment with state policing after several years of a single police system needs to put certain measures in place to ensure the dual policing structure is successful. These include constitutional frameworks, recruitment, training, equipping and remuneration. The state police must be properly engineered towards people-orientated policing.

The Police Council which advises the president on the appointment of the inspector general of police and Police Service Commission which is responsible for the appointment, promotion, discipline, and dismissal of all police officers must be legally and practically autonomous.

There must also be financial and operational independence of the state police and strict adherence to professionalism by the force.

Every reform comes with initial challenges. The governments must be ready to abide by the principle of true federalism. Citizens too must be alive to their civic responsibilities, duties and obligations. Otherwise state police will not be successful and it won’t be long before people will begin to clamour for its abolition.

Based on your research, do you think the current conditions in Nigeria are suitable for introducing state police?

The current security situation in Nigeria calls for establishment of state police. It is long overdue.

Nigeria is the only federal state in the world that has a single police system. The United States has county police, state and federal police. The French have Police Municipale, and the Chinese Chengguan. These are equivalent to city police forces.

State police will solve many security challenges in Nigeria but create new ones too, like potential political abuse and jurisdictional issues with the federal police. The country is federal in name but unitary in practice.

The socio-economic and political challenges like terrorism and banditry confronting the country will also be a major problem.

It is hoped that state police in Nigeria will be sustainable in the long run if there is strong political will from the government and greater commitment from the citizenry.

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Money, Food And Survival: What Drives Paid Sex Among Young Mums In 3 African Countries

Transactional sex is a coping strategy for some adolescents. Stephane de Sakutin/AFP via Getty Images

ANTHONY IDOWU AJAYI, BERYL NYATUGA MACHOKA AND CAROLINE W. KABIRU

Transactional sex, defined as the exchange of sex for money, food, or favours, is common among young people in Africa. Studies have reported that about 10% of those aged 15-24 have engaged in this exchange in South Africa, 23% in Nigeria and 25% in Uganda. The behaviour has been linked to negative consequences such as unintended pregnancy, sexual violence and HIV infections.

Transactional sex refers to sexual relationships outside marriage that are not classified as commercial sex work, but where there is an expectation that material, financial or other benefits will be exchanged for intimacy or companionship.

We are sexual and reproductive health researchers focused on the intersection of evidence, policy, and lived realities of adolescents in Africa. We recently examined the extent and drivers of transactional sex among pregnant and parenting adolescents in three African countries: Burkina Faso, Kenya and Malawi.

In our earlier qualitative research work with pregnant and parenting girls in Nairobi’s informal settlements, we found that pregnancy intensified economic insecurity. The focus of government and most NGOs, however is mainly on preventing adolescent pregnancy. Little attention is paid to the plight and realities of pregnant and parenting girls.

Our research set out to bring attention to these girls. We did this by examining the prevalence and correlates of transactional sex among adolescents in Burkina Faso, Kenya and Malawi. We surveyed 2,243 girls: 980 in Ouagadogou, Burkina Faso; 594 in Korogocho, Nairobi, Kenya; and 669 in Blantyre, Malawi. They were all either pregnant or already parenting. The youngest participants were 12 years old in Burkina Faso and 13 years old in Kenya and Malawi. The oldest girls in all three countries were 19.

Our findings indicated that transactional sex prevalence varied by context. Living in urban informal settlement environments was a risk. The results were a reminder of the need for stronger support systems for adolescents engaged in transactional sex across the three countries, including those who are pregnant or parenting.

Our findings

Our study found that 44.3% of the girls we surveyed in Kenya, 25.4% in Burkina Faso, and 13.0% in Malawi had engaged in transactional sex at some time. The particularly high prevalence in Kenya reflects the study setting in one of Nairobi’s densely populated informal settlements. There, adolescent girls face poverty, unstable support systems, unsafe living conditions, and limited opportunities for self-development. Other studies have also shown that prevalence is lower in other settings outside informal settlements.

The most common reason girls gave for engaging in transactional sex was money. Money was a reason reported by 31.3% of participants in Kenya, 20.5% in Burkina Faso, and 7.8% in Malawi. But girls also reported exchanging sex for food, rent, shelter, clothing, school fees and sanitary pads.

In Kenya, 13.5% specifically cited sanitary pads, compared to 1.0% in Burkina Faso and 1.8% in Malawi. Smaller percentages engaged in transactional sex for school fees, phones or airtime, or other needs such as baby supplies (milk, diapers, clothes).

Individual-level factors

At the individual level, being single increased the likelihood of transactional sex across all three countries. In Burkina Faso, 20% of married and 46% of single girls had transactional sex. In Kenya it was 28% of married girls and 50% of single girls. In Malawi it was 10% of married girls and 16% of single girls.

This suggests that having a partner may provide some degree of financial, material and childcare support. Without support, single adolescent mothers may face pregnancy and early motherhood with very limited resources, increasing their vulnerability to transactional relationships.

One of the surprising findings emerged from Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso. There, 31% of adolescents with a secondary education had engaged in transactional sex, against 21% of those with only a primary education. This challenges the common assumption that education is an immediate shield against exploitation. It suggests that remaining in school may itself become financially difficult for adolescent girls living under poverty and weak support systems. For girls who are in school from a poor background, the need for money, food and school fees may make them engage in transactional sex.

Substance use also more than doubled the risk in Burkina Faso, among girls who reported using alcohol or drugs compared to those who did not. This association was not significant in Kenya or Malawi.

Interpersonal-level factors

At the interpersonal level, orphanhood mattered, though differently across countries.

In Malawi, girls who had lost both parents faced nearly double the risk of engaging in transactional sex, compared with non-orphans. In Kenya, girls who had lost one parent were 43% more likely to engage in transactional sex. Even more significant at the interpersonal level was the impact of low parental support in Malawi, where girls who felt unsupported by their parents were three times more likely to engage in transactional sex.

Community-level factors

We asked participants questions to assess how safe they felt in their neighbourhoods. In Kenya and Burkina Faso, a higher score for perceived neighbourhood safety was associated with a lower likelihood of transactional sex. Girls said they engaged in sex in exchange for security and protection. In Malawi, feeling safe didn’t make a difference.

What needs to change

The study demonstrates that transactional sex among pregnant and parenting adolescents is less a choice than a strategy to cope with severe socioeconomic hardship. It is shaped by distinct individual risks, fracturing family support and community insecurity.

What drives transactional sex changes from country to country. Because of this, programmes to address it need to be customised for each specific place.

Interventions should address structural vulnerabilities and strengthen family and community support systems. They must also improve neighbourhood safety to reduce adolescent mothers’ reliance on transactional sex and the harms associated with it.

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Washington Killed An ISIS Commander In Nigeria, But Has More To Do In West Africa

BY SAMUEL BEN-UR

Nigeria’s Christians are among the most persecuted in the world. They face threats from Muslim Fulani herdsmen who have raided villages and killed hundreds of believers. They also face threats from terror groups known around the world for their brutality, such as Islamic State (ISIS), against which a significant victory was recently achieved.

In a joint operation on May 16, U.S. and Nigerian forces killed Abu Musab al-Minuki, a key figure in ISIS and its affiliate, Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP). The Nigerian military described the raid as a “meticulously planned and highly complex precision air-land operation.” President Donald Trump called al-Minuki “the most active terrorist in the world,” and “second-in-command of ISIS globally.”

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth put the matter in a different light: U.S. forces had hunted an ISIS leader “who was killing Christians.”

Al-Minuki’s death represents a major achievement in Washington’s ongoing campaign to stem the growing tide of Christian persecution and instability in Nigeria. While ISWAP is neither the only nor the most pervasive threat facing Abuja’s Christian community, killing al-Minuki represents tangible progress. To capitalize on this success, Washington should attend to all threats making Nigeria unsafe for Christians and other citizens alike.

Analysts dispute whether al-Minuki was truly ISIS’s global No. 2. What is not in doubt is that one of ISWAP’s most important commanders is dead. His network has helped make Nigeria one of the deadliest countries in the world for Christians.

Nigerian reporting tied al-Minuki to the February 2018 Dapchi schoolgirls kidnapping, when ISWAP terrorists abducted more than 100 students from the Government Girls’ Science and Technical College in Yobe State. Leah Sharibu, a Christian girl who reportedly refused to renounce her faith, remains in captivity and has become a symbol of Nigeria’s persecution crisis.

In December 2019, ISWAP released a video of its terrorists executing 11 blindfolded Christians in northeast Nigeria. The killers called the murders “a message to Christians all over the world.” The next year, ISWAP abducted and executed Ropvil Daciya Dalep, a Christian university student, declaring that Christians “must know that we will never forget their atrocities against us.”

ISWAP also carried out the Pentecost Sunday massacre at St. Francis Xavier Catholic Church in 2022. Gunmen disguised as worshippers detonated explosives and opened fire during Mass, killing at least 40 people and wounding more than 100. In 2026 testimony before the Federal High Court in Abuja, a witness identified the attackers as members of an ISWAP-linked cell based in Kogi State, operating under the alias “Al-Shabaab,” and tied to the broader command network al-Minuki helped oversee.

To describe all this merely as “insecurity” is to miss the point. Nigeria’s Christians are not the only victims of jihadist violence. Muslims in the northeast and northwest have also suffered grievously at the hands of Boko Haram, ISWAP, bandits, and other armed groups.

While organized Islamic terrorists may make headlines, they are not the greatest threat to Christians in Nigeria. Instead, the greatest threats facing Nigerian Christians are from militant gangs of Fulani herdsmen.

This is especially true in Nigeria’s Middle Belt, where armed Fulani militant networks have attacked Christian communities in Benue, Plateau, and surrounding states. The Fulani are an ethnic group of about 25-40 million in West Africa, historically defined by cattle-herding. While many of them no longer practice pastoralism as a way of life, their group identity is still strongly associated with raising livestock. Land, water, grazing routes, and criminality all contribute to the anti-Christian violence perpetrated by some Fulani militants, and yet these factors do not tell the whole story.

Instead, as scholars of international religious liberty such as Baylor’s Paul Marshall have shown, there is a significant element of anti-Christian violence inexplicable by material explanations alone, something a commonly used phrase like “farmer-herder conflict” works to obscure.

In the case of the Plateau State Massacre in 2023, Fulani gangs killed nearly 200 Christian men, women, and children on Christmas Eve while reportedly shouting, “Allahu Akbar, we will destroy all Christians.” Policymakers and journalists should not hide behind sociological euphemisms to explain away attacks that have clear religious motivations.

The Nigerian government’s response has also often been a mix of incapacity and denial. Abuja resists the “Christian persecution” label even as it often fails to prevent attacks on communities and subsequently lies about the scale of and motivations behind massacres and kidnappings. Village communities complain that security forces arrive late or not at all.

In the northeast, ISWAP survives because it exploits weak governance, borderland sanctuaries, and inconsistent intelligence coverage. The result is a state that can sometimes strike terrorists but often fails to protect Christians from slaughter.

Increased cooperation between Washington and Abuja is a start, but Nigerian President Bola Tinubu’s government must publicly and accurately diagnose the challenges facing its people. Killing al-Minuki wasn’t significant purely because he was an archterrorist. He also perpetrated atrocities, including the massacre of hundreds of Christians, though Abuja has yet to highlight this fact.

Nigeria’s Christians need a government willing to name their persecutors, protect their villages, rescue their children, prosecute their attackers, and accept help when its own capabilities fall short. The United States cannot solve Nigeria’s religious violence for Nigeria. But it can make clear that anti-Christian persecution is not a peripheral humanitarian concern; it is central to Nigeria’s security crisis and to America’s counterterrorism interests.

The United States should create a Nigeria religious-violence targeting cell inside the embassy in Abuja, linking State, Defense, Treasury, and intelligence officials working with trusted Nigerian civil society groups and church networks. Its job should be to map ISWAP, Boko Haram, Fulani militant, and bandit networks that attack religious communities. It can then identify commanders, financiers, arms suppliers, cattle-rustling facilitators, ransom brokers, and corrupt local officials, and feed that evidence into Treasury and State sanctions packages.

The State Department should also make any major expansion of U.S.-Nigeria security cooperation contingent on Abuja producing a public, incident-level accounting of attacks on Christian communities, including listing the perpetrators, the religious identity of victims where relevant, security response times, arrests, prosecutions, and convictions.

Al-Minuki’s death will not bring Leah Sharibu home or rebuild every burned church. But it proves the men who organize this violence can be found. The question is whether Washington and Abuja will treat that success as final—or as the beginning of a serious campaign to defend Nigeria’s most vulnerable communities.

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Mali’s Security Crisis Holds Warnings For Nigeria: Here’s Why

Nigerian soldiers prepare to patrol in Maiduguri. Audu Marte/AFP via Getty Images

BY SAHEED BABAJIDE OWONIKOKO

RESEARCHER, CENTER FOR PEACE AND

SECURITY STUDIES, MODDIBO ADAMA

UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY, YOLA

Mali and Nigeria, two of the countries in the Sahel region of west Africa, are separated by approximately 1,000 kilometres, with the Niger Republic between them. They differ in population size and government, but they face some of the same threats.

Mali has a population of about 22.4 million, while Nigeria has about 223.8 million. While Nigeria has been a democracy since 1999, Mali has had a military government since 2020.

The two are similar in that they are threatened by multiple armed groups operating in their territories.

Three armed groups – Islamic State Sahel Province (ISSP/ISGS), Jama'a Nusrat ul-Islam wa al-Muslimin (JNIM) and the Azawad Liberation Front (FLA) – are shaping the conflict in Mali.

This reached a new high in April 2026 when Jama'a Nusrat ul-Islam wa al-Muslimin and the Azawad Liberation Front carried out coordinated attacks across Mali.

The northern cities of Kidal and Mopti, as well as military bases in Sevare and Gao, were captured. The heart of Bamako, the capital city of Mali, was also struck, leading to the death of the defence minister, Sadio Camara.

Nigeria too has been threatened by jihadist insurgence and banditry in the north as well as secessionists and militancy in the south. Jama’at Ahl al-Sunna li al-Da’wa wa al-Jihad (JAS) and the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) are active in the north.

Nigeria lost two brigadier generals fighting the insurgents in the north-east between November 2025 and April 2026.

The weakness of the state plays a significant role in the vulnerability of both countries to attacks. As a scholar who has followed the unfolding events in the Sahel, I draw lessons for Nigeria from the April attacks in Mali.

Those lessons include the possibility of alignment among armed groups, the danger of the jihadists advancing to other Sahelian countries, the audacity of the groups, and the possibility that gains of JNIM in Mali could incite rival groups in Nigeria.

Key lessons for Nigeria

The first lesson concerns armed groups teaming up to fight the state. The April attackers were a combined force of FLA and JNIM. These groups share a common aim: securing enclaves within Mali. They joined efforts to carry out the attacks, each focusing on the areas they wished to control.

In the same vein, Nigeria has battled many armed groups. Competition, rather than cooperation, has defined the relationship between these groups, especially in northern Nigeria. This has always been to the advantage of the Nigerian state. The erstwhile charismatic leader of terror group Boko Haram, Abubakar Shekau, survived for more than a decade but died during clashes between his group, JAS and ISWAP members.

This led to a decline in Boko Haram’s activities, although they are now gradually resurging.

However, there is evidence of an unfolding alliance between terrorists in the north-east and bandits in the north-central and north-west areas of Nigeria. Such alliance have often been in terms of tactical cooperation as well as exchange of members and arms.

There is also a possibility of closing ranks and joining forces between Boko Haram and ISWAP, especially if leaders who favour working together with ISWAP take over Boko Haram from Bakura Doro, the current leader of JAS, after the death of Abukakar Shekau. If this happens, it may escalate terrorist activities that may be difficult for Nigeria to manage.

The second lesson is that the audacity of the JNIM/FLA coalition and the results achieved can motivate related groups to act in other parts of the Sahel. The al-Qaeda-linked and ISIS-linked terrorist groups have been involved in a competition for control of the Sahel for a long period.

This comes in the form of direct armed attacks against each other, competition over territory and recruiting, and attempting to demonstrate the ability to cause more violence than the other. This has led to an increase in jihadist attacks.

JNIM’s takeover of some cities in Mali may encourage its ISIS-affiliated rivals in the Greater Sahara and Lake Chad to also increase their violence.

In the Lake Chad Region, ISWAP has intensified attacks against military formations while also building parallel states in many areas of the Lake Chad basin, with Nigeria being the most affected.

Lastly, with the capture of Kidal and attacks near Bamako, JNIM may be close to capturing Mali. If Mali falls, it could be a training ground for terrorists in the Sahel. This fear was the reason Nigeria mobilised its forces for a peacekeeping mission in Mali in 2012. And if Mali falls, Burkina Faso and Niger will be threatened.

The threat to Niger is a significant problem because it is a buffer zone for Nigeria. Meanwhile Nigeria is a major target of the jihadist insurgents in their move to extend towards coastal west Africa.

What should Nigeria do?

Mali’s experience could turn the lens on Nigeria. Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso have opted out of the Economic Community of West African States, Ecowas. But Nigeria and other countries in the region should not abandon the breakaway states at this stage. Necessary regional support should be galvanised and Nigeria can still play a leading role in this.

In my view, Nigeria also needs to rejig its counter-terrorism to be more responsive. Rather than its current defensive posture, which gives jihadists the opportunity to plan, Nigeria ought to adopt sophisticated and strategic offensive counter-terrorism that takes the war to the jihadists.

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Nigeria’s Budget Is Treated Like A Government Secret: How An Online Public Monitoring System Could Fight Corruption

BY TOLU OLAREWAJU

ECONOMIST AND POSTGRADUATE

SUPERVISOR, UNIVERSITY OF 

LANCASHIRE, KEELE UNIVERSITY

Nigerians have no reliable way of scrutinising the national budget. The citizen’s portal of the Nigerian Budget Office of the Federation is often offline, and when it is online, it is highly technical and difficult for ordinary citizens to understand.

Data on the Nigerian budget sourced elsewhere online is also frequently hard to find and incomplete. As a result, the Nigerian budget is treated like a government secret and Nigerian citizens are unable to effectively scrutinise the government’s income and expenditure decisions.

My research shows that this disrupts the social contract between the citizens and the government of Nigeria and creates an opportunity for corruption.

The World Justice Project estimates that corruption has cost the Nigerian economy more than US$550 billion since 1960. And a report by the accounting firm PwC shows that corruption in Nigeria could cost up to 37% of the nation’s GDP by 2030 if it’s not dealt with immediately.

I am an economist whose research focuses on poverty and corruption reduction. In a recent paper, I show how secrecy fuels corruption in the management of Nigeria’s finances. I set out how citizen monitoring and digital engagement can enhance transparency and accountability.

I also identify some obstacles to making this a reality in Nigeria. These include technical capacity limitations, weak enforcement mechanisms, and political resistance.

To overcome these challenges, the government must invest in digital infrastructure. Fostering civic engagement and independent oversight, too, can ensure sustained accountability and effective implementation.

Budgetary secrecy and corruption in Nigeria

The Open Budget Survey is produced by the International Budget Partnership. It provides the main global assessment of budget accountability in the world and evaluates:

public participation: formal and meaningful opportunities for the public to engage in the national budget process

oversight: institutions such as the legislature, national audit office and independent bodies

transparency: comprehensive budget information, made available to the public in a timely and accessible manner.

Nigeria performed poorly in the 2023 survey. It scored 19/100 in public participation, 61/100 in oversight, and 31/100 in transparency. It ranked 92 out of 125 countries. This was below several African peers and the global average of 45.

This marks a decline from 2021. Nigeria scored higher then in public participation (26) and transparency (45), while oversight has remained unchanged.

The drop is largely due to the government’s failure to publish key fiscal reports on time. These include in-year reports and mid-year reviews.

The source of the problem

My research found that government budgetary secrecy and corruption in Nigeria have historical roots. They stem from the era of colonial taxation, when colonialists collected taxes but didn’t invest in the people’s wellbeing.

But these bad practices have intensified since independence. About 47% of Nigeria’s 232.68 million people live in multidimensional poverty. This is a clear sign that Nigeria is not spending its resources wisely. Development, job creation and service delivery are all lacking.

My research found that even when funds are budgeted, secrecy facilitates fraud in a number of ways.

The first way is through vaguely specified budgeted projects. Many projects are listed without quantity or location. They use terms like “empowerment and sensitisation” or “provision of infrastructure”.

Secondly, through the budgeting of non-beneficial initiatives. Nigeria’s approved federal budget for 2025 included US$1.5 billion for health, US$2.5 billion for education and US$1.7 billion for agriculture. However, a whopping US$17 billion was allocated for the presidency.

Thirdly, through inflated figures for budgeted items. For example, the purchase of a car for ₦375 million (US$278,000).

Fourth, through the under-delivery and abandonment of projects.

Nigeria’s budgetary corruption is reinforced by a complex three-tier system of budgeting at the federal, state, and local government levels.

At the federal level, the budget is prepared by the executive (president and ministries). It is coordinated by the Budget Office, approved by the National Assembly, and enacted as the “Appropriation Act”. However, limited and delayed fiscal disclosures enable budget padding, vague allocations, and weak expenditure tracking.

At the state level, budgets are prepared by governors and state ministries. They are approved by the State Houses of Assembly, focusing on state needs. However, inconsistent publication of budgets and reports at this level makes it difficult to monitor spending and creates room for misallocation.

At the local level, budgets are prepared by local government officials. However, they are heavily influenced by state governments and approved by local councils. Here, a lack of financial autonomy and state control over funds leads to diversion, ghost projects, and minimal accountability to citizens.

The solution

The Nigerian government says it also has an Open Treasury Portal that provides transparency in its budgeting system. My research shows that this platform also suffers from technical glitches, incomplete data, and low enforcement.

BudgIT, a Nigerian civic technology organisation, uses data visualisation and storytelling to try to make the government budget more accessible to citizens, but its impact is also limited by insufficient data availability.

Advances in information technology make it possible for Nigeria to build a real-time online government budget system that the public can access and monitor. This would cover financial statements and reports across federal, state and local governments. Nigerians could also use a system like this to vote on projects the government should focus on.

South Korea has a similar model. Known as the Digital Budget and Accounting System (dBrain), it is a fully integrated system for budget planning, execution and monitoring of government finances across agencies in real time.

Another country, Georgia, has an e-budget transparency system. It provides real-time budget execution data and is integrated with the goverment’s e-procurement and treasury systems.

The US also has the USAspending.gov service, which tracks federal spending in real time and provides publicly accessible and searchable data on what the federal government spends.

Importantly, real-time online budget monitoring enables quick detection of corruption, but its effectiveness depends on clear and consistently enforced penalties.

What needs to be done

An online government budget system which the public could monitor would improve transparency and accountability in Nigeria. Technologies such as Enterprise Resource Planning systems and Integrated Financial Management Information systems enable real-time budget tracking and integrated financial management. Blockchain can further strengthen transparency through secure records. Also, cloud computing can improve accessibility and data security.

Data analytics and AI can enhance forecasting, automate monitoring, and improve decision-making. This would make budgeting more efficient, transparent and responsive.

The Nigeria Tax Administration Act has introduced a digital tax system requiring Nigerian taxpayers to keep accurate transaction records.

The Nigerian government aims to use this to improve efficiency, accuracy and transparency in its tax system. The government should implement a similar system for all its own financial transactions.

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Nigeria’s New Election Law Leaves Gaps: 5 Reforms For Free, Fair And Credible Polls

Voters queue to vote in 2023 elections, Lagos, Nigeria. NurPhoto/Getty Images

BY EMMANUEL REMI AIYEDE

PROFESSOR OF POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS,

GOVERNANCE AND PUBLIC POLICY,

UNVERSITY OF IBADAN

Nigeria’s new Electoral Act, passed in February 2026, is a significant attempt to overhaul the country’s electoral framework.

The act establishes a dedicated funding framework and requires that election funds be released no later than six months before a general election.

Technology will be the only method allowed for voter accreditation, and results will have to be transmitted electronically.

There will be stricter penalties for electoral misconduct such as falsifying results and manipulating or buying votes.

Political parties must maintain a digital membership register and submit it to the electoral commission at least 21 days before their primaries.

With these and other provisions, the act provides a stronger foundation for Nigeria’s elections than its predecessor. It helps in the push for technological integration and financial autonomy for the electoral commission.

However, laws alone do not guarantee credible elections.

It’s my view, as a scholar of electoral systems and governance in Nigeria, that the act doesn’t tackle some of the real problems of electoral governance. There are deeper structural issues that should be addressed to improve electoral integrity.

I submit that Nigeria needs five urgent reforms to create a free and fair voting system. These are:

strengthening the independence of the electoral commission

improving the candidate selection process

enhancing electoral transparency

addressing voter apathy

ensuring severe punishment for vote-buying.

My recommendations are based on the gaps in the recently enacted legislation and the historical context of Nigeria’s democratic journey.

Democracy in Nigeria is the primary mechanism for managing the country’s diversity and ensuring that its resources translate into shared prosperity rather than elite enrichment. Nigeria has a history of military rule, secessionist attempts, and inter-ethnic mistrust. Free, fair and credible elections are crucial for resolving political competition without violence.

1. Strengthen the electoral commission

The credibility of any electoral process is tied to the independence and capacity of the electoral management body. The Electoral Act 2026 takes a crucial step by establishing a dedicated fund for the Independent National Electoral Commission.

However, analysis of Nigeria’s electoral reforms since 1999 shows that administrative success is linked to the commission’s ability to exercise political independence. Its leadership appointments should be more transparent and insulated from presidential discretion.

The 2026 act expands the commission’s authority to review questionable result declarations made under duress. To solidify this reform, leadership must be insulated from partisan interference. Only persons with impeccable credentials and a proven record of non-partisanship should be considered.

The president should not be the one to appoint the head of the commission. Several suggestions have been offered, including the one by the Uwais committee that it be done by the National Judicial Council or a multi-stakeholder appointment committee. What matters is that the process be competitive and open. The election focused NGO Yiaga Africa has suggested that the president should publish the list of potential nominees for public scrutiny before sending a name to the National Assembly. An appointment committee should represent various interests, including professional bodies like the Nigerian Bar Association, Nigeria Union of Journalists, and civil society organisations.

2. Strengthen democratic candidate selection

Since 1999, primaries – internal processes through which political parties choose their candidates for public office – have been dominated by money and a small cabal of delegates. Both undermine the will of ordinary party members.

The 2026 Electoral Act confronts this issue by abolishing indirect primaries, which limit voting to selected party delegates. Now, all registered members of a political party will be able to vote in choosing the party’s candidate, except in the case of consensus.

Section 77 mandates that political parties keep a digital register of members and submit it to the electoral body at least 21 days before any primary, congress, or convention. The success of this hinges on the integrity and accuracy of the new registers.

3. Enhance transparency

The 2023 general elections exposed weaknesses in collating and sending results. This erodes public trust.

The 2026 act seeks to address these weak spots by making technology mandatory. Section 47 mandates the use of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System to check that the person casting a vote is who they claim to be. Section 60(3) makes the electronic transmission of results to the viewing portal compulsory.

A loophole remains. The act permits the use of a manual form to send results where the electronic technology fails. The law does not define what “failure” is, nor does it establish an independent process to certify such failures.

This ambiguity recreates the discretion that led to the widespread failures of 2023, where only a fraction of results were uploaded in a timely manner.

4. Address voter apathy

The steady decline in voter turnout from 52.3% in 1999 to an alarming 26.72% in the 2023 general elections is a threat to Nigeria’s democratic legitimacy. It’s not a problem of civic laziness or voter fatigue. In my view it reflects an erosion of trust in the electoral process itself. When the electoral body failed to deliver on its promise of real-time electronic result transmission in 2023, it was a betrayal of citizens.

Restoring voter confidence requires showing that votes count, through electronic transmission of results. Electoral offenders must be prosecuted. Judicial decisions must respect voter intent rather than technicalities.

Immediate practical reforms are possible. They include introducing early voting for the over one million essential workers, security personnel, election officials, journalists and observers who can’t vote on election day. The 15 million Nigerians in the diaspora should be able to vote too, through provisions already adopted by 40 African nations.

5. Criminalising vote buying

Widespread poverty and inequality make Nigerian voters susceptible to vote buying. This reduces elections to auctions rather than choices. Without aggressive enforcement, the secret ballot becomes a commodity. Then democracy becomes a market for the highest bidder, keeping corrupt politicians in office.

Moving forward

Electoral reform is not a single event but a continuous democratic project. Its success will be measured not by statutory text, but by the integrity of the 2027 elections and beyond.

It requires sustained citizen engagement, civil society vigilance, and political determination to build an electoral system that commands the trust and participation of all its people.

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FELA KUTI: ROCK & ROLL HALL OF FAME 2026 INDUCTEE

Fela and Egypt 80 Band performs inside the shrine. Image: William F. Campbell, 1983

"The Shrine

The Rituals.

The Banter, Yabis Night.

The Audience.

The Protest Songs. Related Activism

Societal ills

Politicians and widespread Scandals of Bribery and Corruption

The junta, dictatorship and absolute shutdown of Press Freedom

No one else could have done it"

Afro Beat legend will be presented with the 'Early Influence Award' at the 2026 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction on November 14, 2026 at the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles.

Nigeria Imports 70% Of Its Medicines – Why Local Manufacturing Doesn’t Meet Demand

BY EFEFIOM KOFON

SOAS, UNIVERSITY OF LONDON

Nigeria imports at least 70% of its medicines. This is striking for a country of over 230 million people and at least 120 active pharmaceutical manufacturers.

Domestic manufacturing is largely concentrated in lower-end medicines that require relatively simple production processes. The more complex and higher-value pharmaceutical products continue to be imported.

This pattern has persisted for decades. It reflects two things. First is the limited impact of policies aimed at reducing import dependence. The other is the entrenched interests across pharmaceutical companies. An incentive structure that favours imports over local production.

I recently completed my doctorate studies focusing on the political economy of pharmaceutical manufacturing in Nigeria, with comparisons to Uganda, Bangladesh and India. My research looked at how the industry had evolved and analysed how the distribution of organisational power and manufacturing capabilities has made it difficult for reforms to work.

I found that policy interventions have largely failed because weak institutions cannot influence manufacturers to expand their production capabilties.

The biggest obstacles stem from how power and benefits are distributed across political, bureaucratic and pharmaceutical actors.

Any policy that does not fully take this into account will likely be resisted.

Factors militating against Nigerian manufacturers

Nigerian manufacturers face:

a lack of protection and incentives to produce certain medicines

high levels of imports of finished medicines

pressure to import as well as manufacture

low manufacturing capabilities.

Weak incentive structure:

The first policy to specifically support domestic manufacturers of medicines was introduced in 2005, when the Nigerian government restricted the importation of 17 lower-end medicines. The prohibited medicines included paracetamol, aspirin and metronidazole (antibiotic) tablets.

The protectionist policy has not been expanded since then. So manufacturers have no incentive to invest in technological upgrading to make more complex medicines.

Importation of finished medicines:

At least 100 manufacturers also import medicines – including some that are produced locally. In some cases, manufacturers both produce and import the same medicine, marketing them under different brand names.

Two medicines illustrate this. The antibiotic ciprofloxacin (tablet form) is currently imported by at least 93 registered pharmaceutical companies, even though 21 domestic producers make it too.

A similar pattern is evident for artemether-lumefantrine, a widely used antimalarial medicine. Fewer than 30 pharmaceutical companies produce it locally. More than 200 import it – including some established manufacturers.

Manufacturers as producers and importers:

Many companies combine local manufacturing with importing finished medicines as a way of managing risk.

This creates commercially attractive, lower-risk revenue streams for manufacturers. They are likely to resist policy or reforms that would limit imports in favour of expanded local production.

Low manufacturing capacities:

Nigerian pharmaceutical companies have low manufacturing capacities. And the learning process involved in complex manufacturing is time consuming, costly and risky.

It is also difficult to compel a company to do something where governance is weak.

In the absence of adequate and sustained policy support, many manufacturers rely on political networks to protect their interests or challenge policies that threaten them.

An example is the modification of a regional tariff in 2016 because it threatened locally manufactured medicines. The regional trade policy had imposed zero duty on essential finished medicines and up to 20% on the raw materials used in medicine manufacturing. This was to increase the availability and affordability of essential medicines across the region. Nigerian manufacturers exerted pressure on government to reject it.

In the absence of credible policy support for upgrading into technologically sophisticated medicines, manufacturers continue to rely on imports. Similarly, they continue to influence policy decisions that could disrupt existing revenue streams.

Why the problem persists

When some pharmaceutical companies manufacture medicines locally while others import the same products, it weakens collective action. It’s harder to mobilise around shared policy demands.

The Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Group of Manufacturers Association of Nigeria, an influential trade association, illustrates this challenge. One of its objectives is to lobby for increased market protection for locally produced medicines. But member firms have differing commercial interests in locally manufactured and imported medicines. This often works against policy objectives.

It impedes how member firms form alliances to support or oppose policies. It also affects influence over them.

Nigeria’s reliance on imported medicines has less to do with the commonly cited capability constraints. It is the outcome of a policy vacuum that has made it more attractive to import products.

This dynamic is also evident in some other African countries, such as Ghana, Kenya, and Uganda. Manufacturers similarly import more complex medicines and produce simple medicines locally. There is limited support for domestic manufacturing of more complex medicines.

Moving forward

High levels of imports limit the rewards for expanding manufacturing capabilities and any credible path to competitiveness. The significant revenues generated from imports also weaken incentives to invest in learning how to produce more complex medicines.

Recognising this matters for policymakers and international development organisations.

The challenge is not simply increasing financial support or political commitment. It is designing policies that reconfigure current benefits. They need to make it worthwhile to invest in more complex pharmaceutical manufacturing.

THE CON

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Maternity Health Services In Nigeria Are Failing Women: 4 Steps To Better Care

The paediatric ward, Jos University Teaching Hospital, Plateau State in Nigeria. Photo by Stefan Heunis/AFP via Getty Images

BY OBASANJO BOLARINWA SND REBECCA TADOKERA

Nigeria faces one of the world’s highest maternal mortality rates. Around 1,047 women die for every 100,000 live births, far above the African regional average of about 531 deaths per 100,000. This highlights the fact that not all women are getting maternal healthcare.

Reasons include:

differences in access to healthcare between geographical regions

socio-demographic factors such as education, poverty, age and limited decision-making power within households

religious affiliation, which in some communities shapes health-seeking behaviour

limited exposure to health information

poverty and unemployment

a lack of health insurance.

Nigeria has implemented several maternal health programmes over the past two decades. The National Integrated Maternal, Newborn and Child Strategy, Midwives Service Scheme and Free Maternal and Child Health Programmes were designed to increase skilled birth attendance, improve access to antenatal and postnatal care, and reduce financial barriers to maternal health services.

But progress in reducing maternal deaths has been uneven across Nigeria. Maternal mortality in the north-east and north-west exceeds 1,000 deaths per 100,000 live births, far higher than rates in southern regions of the country. Many women still do not receive essential maternal health services. For example, only 47.8% of women reported delivering with a skilled birth attendant, and millions of women have limited access to regular antenatal care.

The challenge is no longer about identifying the problem. It is about removing the real barriers Nigerian women face.

We are global public health researchers with a focus on maternal health systems in low- and middle-income countries.

Our recent published policy brief highlighted why many women in Nigeria aren’t using maternity services. Our findings suggest that there are four practical shifts that the Nigerian government could make to improve the use of maternity services across Nigeria. These are:

region-specific interventions

increasing the coverage of services so that they’re closer to where women live

removing financial barriers to care

using digital capabilities to overcome gaps in services.

Four interventions that can make a difference

1. Target regions differently

Maternal health policies often take a national approach, but Nigeria is not uniform. Northern and some southern regions face different cultural, religious and geographic barriers. Government policies therefore need to target specific barriers in different regions. For example, improving transport and health facility access in rural areas, expanding community-based maternal services, and strengthening culturally appropriate health education programmes.

Such policies would typically be developed by Nigeria’s Federal Ministry of Health in collaboration with state governments, local health authorities and community organisations. Regional inequalities in maternal death have shown why a uniform policy approach is ineffective. For example, skilled birth attendance is far lower in the north-west than in southern regions.

The Federal Ministry of Health should empower the state governments to:

work with the religious and traditional leaders to promote skilled birth attendance

engage community influencers to counter harmful norms

train health workers in culturally sensitive care

strengthen primary healthcare services in underserved districts.

When communities trust the system, they use it.

2. Take services closer to women

Distance remains a barrier, especially in rural areas. Many women cannot travel long distances while pregnant. In many parts of Nigeria, a health facility may be more than 5-10 kilometres away, and poor roads, limited transport and travel costs make it difficult to reach care.

Mobile health clinics can bridge this gap. They bring antenatal care, family planning and basic obstetric services directly to remote communities. These clinics can be established and operated by state ministries of health and local government health authorities. Though there are mobile clinics in Nigeria currently, there ought to be more.

Outreach teams dedicated to maternal health specifically and including trained midwives, nurses, community health extension workers, volunteer community health workers, supported by local primary healthcare staff should:

provide health education in local languages

offer on-the-spot referrals

use community health workers to track pregnancies early.

Care that comes closer to women increases uptake, as seen in western Kenya.

3. Remove financial barriers

Out-of-pocket payments still prevent many Nigerian women from seeking care. Health insurance coverage remains low. Fewer than 10% of Nigerians are currently covered by any form of health insurance, leaving the majority of households to pay directly for services. This is despite the fact that it was made mandatory for all Nigerians and legal residents in 2022.

Maternal health is meant to be free. But the policy isn’t implemented consistently.

Three reforms are critical:

expand health insurance coverage for maternity service

enforce policies that prevent informal or hidden charges

introduce targeted financial incentives such as vouchers or conditional cash transfers for poor women.

These reforms would require coordinated action across Nigeria’s federal, state and local health systems, which jointly oversee healthcare financing and service delivery.

Evidence from other low- and middle-income countries shows that financial incentives increase service use. When cost is removed, utilisation rises.

Long-term economic empowerment of women is equally important. Women with stable incomes are more likely to seek care.

4. Use digital health to widen access

Nigeria’s digital penetration is growing rapidly. More than 100 million Nigerians use the internet, representing about 45% of the population. Mobile phone penetration exceeds 80% of the population. This creates an opportunity to create digital platforms that:

send appointment reminders

provide pregnancy education

support teleconsultations

use artificial intelligence tools to improve risk screening.

Digital health will not replace physical services. But it can reduce delays, improve awareness and connect women to care earlier.

Rwanda has integrated AI into healthcare through digital platforms that support remote consultations and clinical triage. Tools such as the Babyl telemedicine platform use AI-assisted systems to help nurses assess symptoms, guide treatment decisions and connect patients to doctors through mobile phones, expanding access to care in rural areas. This shows what is possible when technology is used strategically. Nigeria can adapt similar models for maternal health.

Way forward

Nigeria does not need more policy documents. It needs targeted implementation.

First, federal and state governments must align efforts. Nigeria already has national institutions coordinating maternal health policy, including the Federal Ministry of Health and Social Welfare and the National Primary Health Care Development Agency. But because health services are delivered largely by state and local governments, implementation varies widely. Maternal health policies should be state-specific but nationally coordinated and adapted to state-specific realities.

Second, funding must prioritise primary healthcare and community engagement. Investments should focus on where utilisation is lowest.

Third, monitoring systems must improve. Data should guide decisions at local levels. Programmes that work should be scaled. Those that fail should be redesigned.

Finally, women themselves must be part of policy design. Solutions imposed from above rarely succeed. Improving maternity service use is not only a health goal. It strengthens families, communities and the economy.

The next step is clear: implement smarter, targeted policies that remove barriers and bring care closer to every woman.

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