The 300 metres separating Aisha Ali’s new house from the old farmhouse may seem short, but it represents the long journey of her life. The 45-year-old widow crosses fields of various crops that she tends.
Aisha was not an active farmer; her late husband handled that. However, he was abducted in 2023 by Boko Haram terrorists while working on their farm in Malari Village, Mafa Local Government Area of Borno State, northeastern Nigeria, and was later killed after they failed to pay a ransom.
“My life changed tragically,” she recounted with a weary calm.
Aisha’s husband’s death made her the breadwinner of a 10-person household, which included her six children and three of her husband’s siblings. She had no choice but to take up the hoe.
A year later, her 10-year-old son was abducted by terrorists. He was later released when they learned that they had killed his father in the past.
It was under this constant shadow of fear, relying on subsistence farming and petty trade, that Aisha and her family found a fragile balance until the night the water came.
The midnight escape
In September 2024, a ruptured dam in nearby Alau, coupled with heavy rainfall, led to floods that submerged Maiduguri and surrounding communities, including Muna displacement camp, where Aisha lived with her family.
They had gone to bed after an exhausting day, but around midnight, screams from the neighbours woke them up. “I woke up and saw water everywhere,” she recounted.
Amid the terrifying mix of darkness and rising water, there was no time to save their belongings. She rallied her children, strapped the youngest to her back, and fled into the downpour.
Together with other displaced persons, they walked for hours until they found dry land, where they stayed until dawn. When the water subsided, Aisha returned to find her entire life washed away. “We became homeless without our belongings,” she said.
A doorless shelter and hope
Staying at the displacement camp was not an option, as the government had already planned to shut it down. “Returning to Dubula, our ancestral home, was not an option either,” she said
Aisha looked for shelter nearby and found one on credit—an uncompleted building. The structure had no doors, leaving her family vulnerable to constant theft. What few items they acquired were often stolen when they stepped out, turning their temporary shelter into a trap of insecurity. The widow, who had survived both Boko Haram and the flood, now faced the demoralising grind of daily survival in an exposed space.
Since there was no other alternative, they continued living in the building.
Aisha said it was overwhelming, but she held onto hope and did the best she could to care for her children. Weeks later, SOS Children’s Village, a global humanitarian organisation, visited the community for an assessment. “When they came around, I initially dismissed them for one of those numerous NGOs that normally come around to take our data but offer nothing much but some measures of grains,” Aisha told HumAngle. However, she registered with them as a widow and head of her household.
SOS returned with support that Aisha describes as “an investment in dignity”. She underwent training in smart farming techniques, followed by a starter kit of essential tools: a pumping machine for irrigation, a spraying machine, insecticides, fertiliser, a wheelbarrow, and processed seeds.
“This support transformed our lives and brought relative comfort to us,” she added.
The first harvest
With the implements, cash support, and farming inputs, Aisha got to work. She cultivated beans, pepper, tomato, okra, onion, and yams.
She made her first harvest this farming season. “I was able to use the money from my first farm harvest to escape the unsafe shed,” she said, adding that she paid ₦30,000 for half a year’s rent on their current house. Her family now has enough food, and the surplus is sold to cover essential needs like medication.
“I am most excited that for the first time, my children are now in school—something we could not afford before,” she told HumAngle.
Aisha explained that her income varies depending on what she takes to the market and how much she can harvest. “There is no fixed amount,” she said. “For beans, a full ‘mudu’ — that’s a standard measuring bowl — sells for between ₦1,200 and ₦1,300. Sometimes I sell up to half a bag, which is about 20 mudus. For tomatoes, a basket goes for about ₦25,000, and we usually get two or three baskets, depending on the yield.”
She hopes that the cycle of loss and disaster has finally been broken.
“I thank the SOS people for coming to our aid because only God knows the fate that would have befallen me and my family if I had not received their support. They didn’t come to give us fish, but they came to teach us fishing,” she said.
Aisha said other women also received the support: “I saw them during the training, and I believe they are doing well with their families as well.”
According to Fredson Ogbeche, the Humanitarian Action Manager at SOS Children’s Village Nigeria, “One hundred families, many headed by women transforming grief into drive just like Aisha, benefitted from the intervention.”
One of the women, Aisha Bukar, is also a widow. The 55-year-old lives in the Elmiskin 2 area of Jere LGA, Borno State. Life has been a relentless succession of personal loss as she has buried seven of her 12 children over the years due to the conflict and lost her husband to a prolonged illness. This overwhelming hardship was compounded last year when destructive floodwaters swept through her home. Having lost everything in the flood, she had to start all over again.
“What the government offered as a palliative for the flood survivors did not go around to many of us. We were almost stranded until SOS came to assist us,” she said.
SOS Children’s Villages Nigeria is one of the humanitarian organisations that provided post-flooding recovery support for survivors. Aside from the farm implements and inputs, the organisation gave ₦395,000 to each beneficiary.
Bukar did not go to the farm. She used the funding to meet domestic needs and also started a tailoring business where they mass-produce and sell children’s clothes.
She said that the steady income has given her daughter a second chance at education.