Understanding the Threats to the Human Rights of Displaced Nigerian Returnees: A Contemporary Evaluation

Human rights violations are faced by different classes of persons in a society, but there are distinct violations that confront returnees due to displacement by war or conflict, and through the relocation process. The degree of vulnerability of individuals and groups at risk must be constantly reassessed in light of changes in the situation on ground at any point in time. This paper found that relocation by returnees is not often a seamless process and returnees have to struggle for the basic rights to survive and re-integrate into communities. Indeed this often unacknowledged group of displaced persons are also vulnerable to abuse, human rights violations and discrimination of different categories. There is need for government and its institutions to pay particular attention to this group of persons as a distinct vulnerable sect, even as this research identified the different conditions in which the human rights of displaced returnees can be further threatened in Nigeria.