Limbe, Cameroon and Eket, Nigeria — It was just before 3pm on a weekday, and 17-year-old Paul Ngoa* was returning home from his job at a phone and watch repair shop in Limbe, a coastal town in the southwestern region of Cameroon. Tired and sweaty, he prepares to head out to his second job as a washerwoman in a nearby village.

“There’s a lot to finance,” says the teenager, who earns between 3,000 and 7,500 Central African francs ($4.72 to $11.79) a week from both jobs. Ngoa donates most of his income to Florence*, his 45-year-old single mother, who earns 4,500-6,000 CFA francs ($7-9) a week selling vegetables and fish on the side of the road.

Despite their shared income, the family finds it difficult to support itself and sometimes resorts to borrowing.

Meanwhile, Nagwa’s two sisters, aged 13 and 15, work in agriculture to help the family and pass the time.

Years ago, 3pm was the time when many schoolchildren in Limbe would return home after a day of learning. But since the outbreak of a separatist crisis in Cameroon’s English-speaking regions in 2016 – with some violence targeting schools – such routines have disappeared for many students, interrupting their education.

He told Al Jazeera that the fear of being attacked forced the Najwa siblings to abandon their studies. “a lot [children] He now works in hard jobs, while others live in trauma caused by security forces and separatist groups who assaulted them, killed their loved ones, raped them, or kidnapped them.

Since the conflict began, thousands of people have been displaced and killed in Cameroon’s Anglophone southwest and northwest regions, and nearly 500,000 children will be out of school in 2024, according to UNICEF.

Meanwhile, 150 kilometers (93 miles) away from Limbe by sea, in neighboring southeastern Nigeria, another separatist uprising is rocking the Igbo-majority region, putting children at risk as well.

Separatist agitators in that region impose frequent stay-at-home orders targeting businesses and schools; This has led to increased fear among teachers, parents and students, leading to increased apathy towards education as safety concerns continue to grow.

“Rejoice”*, a 15-year-old student in Orlu in southeastern Nigeria, whose last name we are not using for safety reasons, relayed her ordeal to Al Jazeera. She said her father prevented her from going to school in 2023 after separatist fighters killed her close friend and family during a sit-in campaign at home.

Earlier that year, Rejoice’s 43-year-old mother had a fatal asthma attack on another day of sitting at home. Neighbors, fearing retaliation for violating the order, refused to help transport her to the hospital. “I was alone with her,” she said, recounting the day her mother died.

“Anyone could be killed, it’s terrible,” Rejoice said, her voice trembling as she spoke. “This is our silent cry: we want peace restored, and I want to see my friends at school again.”

Unreported trauma

Children in separatist conflict zones in Cameroon and Nigeria are suffering underreported trauma, as violence spreads across borders, experts say. To understand the situation, Al Jazeera spoke to more than 40 children, humanitarian workers and education directors in the affected areas.

Tales like “Najwa” are common in the English-speaking regions of Cameroon, which have been plagued by massacres, kidnappings, sexual violence and displacement, or “Rejoice” in Nigeria’s southeastern region, where fear and uncertainty of violent separatist conflict have disrupted education and economic stability.

“Modern separatism in both countries is driven by economic injustice, political deprivation, and heavy security measures,” Mark Doerksen, a research associate at the African Center for Strategic Studies, told Al Jazeera.

In Cameroon’s English-speaking regions, secessionists have long protested against marginalization by the French-speaking majority, which has controlled affairs of government since the unification of the bilingual regions in 1961. In 2016, demands for political autonomy grew, with lawyers and teachers rising up in Peaceful protest against separatists. The central government regarding the imposition of Francophone regulations and customs.

The government responded with a violent crackdown, including arresting hundreds, and by 2017, an armed separatist movement announced that it would create an independent, English-speaking Cameroon, called Ambazonia.

Likewise, the separatist crisis in Nigeria dates back to the early post-independence years.

In 1967, due to political tensions, ethnic divisions, and violence against the Igbo community, a military separatist leader declared the country’s old eastern region an independent state, Biafra. But the ensuing civil war led to the separation of the separatists. defeat and its integration into Nigeria.

In 2012, Nnamdi Kanu, then 45, who was on trial in Nigeria for treason, reignited the separatist campaign against Igbo mistreatment, using the media to promote separatist messages. His trial enabled Simon Ekpa, 39, who faces terrorism charges in Finland, to lead a faction that escalated the movement with violent clashes and deadly consequences for those who defy orders to picket homes in the area.

“Beat” teachers and “burn” schools

At the beginning of the Anglophone crisis in Cameroon, there were many civilian casualties as a result of indiscriminate violence, abuses, and widespread raids committed by government forces. “I miss my father’s voice,” said Ngoa, whose father went to work in Bamenda, northwest Cameroon, but mysteriously disappeared during a government raid in late 2016.

After the declaration of independence of Ambazonia, separatist rebels increasingly displaced Yaounde-controlled institutions, especially schools, which they viewed as tools of French-speaking discrimination and oppression in Anglophone regions.

“In 2018, during school hours, we heard gunfire and were terrified. Separatist fighters came to close the school. They beat some teachers and burned the building,” Najwa said.

“That was the last time I went to school.”

A joint study by the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime (GI-TOC) and Armed Conflict Location and Event Data (ACLED) showed how diaspora funding for separatist movements has diminished due to increased violence against civilians and tightened government oversight of remittances. The separatist rebels then resorted to extortion, smuggling and imposing so-called “liberation taxes” to finance their operations. Children outside school do not escape exploitation.

In 2023, Anita*, a 17-year-old Cameroonian refugee now living in Calabar, Nigeria, was working on a farm in Mamfi, in southwestern Cameroon, when separatist fighters arrived. They demanded a liberation tax, but the farm owners were absent. She said they were angry and disappointed, so they kidnapped seven children, including Anita, and some adults, and took them to the hills.

“We spent two days with the separatists, and during that time, I and two other girls were brutally raped,” she recounts.

Since 2016, the number of English-speaking Cameroonians has reached more than 6,000 people killing Human Rights Watch said children in separatist conflicts, including many children, with more than a million displaced to other parts of Cameroon and Nigeria.

“worrying”

In Nigeria, sit-at-home orders have spread in the southeast of the country by the indigenous People of Biafra, a separatist group, to protest or commemorate certain events. In August 2021, orders increased as the group demanded the release of its leader, Kanu, who was arrested and extradited in Kenya earlier that year. By 2022, while Kanu remained in detention, rebels loyal to Ekpa based in Finland continued to carry out orders.

“When these orders are issued, for fear of violence, parents force schools to abide by them, disrupting the school week,” said the principal of a government-owned secondary school in the southeastern Nigerian city of Nsukka. “A few people barely return to school for several days, or stay at home permanently,” he told Al Jazeera, speaking anonymously to avoid reprisals.

Since 2021, separatist conflict in southeastern Nigeria has claimed at least 1,155 lives, although critics say the death toll is higher. While there is no recent data available on the number of children out of school due to conflict, A He studies The United Nations estimates that violence and gender disparities have forced about 664,000 children to leave school – a worrying number for a region that was once known for high student enrollment rates.

“It is the psychological impact and bonding resulting from the conflict that keeps school children out of the classroom,” said the school principal in Nsukka.

The Orlu student told Al Jazeera that three girls from her neighborhood and six of her classmates had moved to safer areas in southwestern Nigeria to continue their studies due to fears of violence and uncertainty. “Without relatives or friends outside the area, you either stay at home or risk going to school,” she said.

For Stanley Onyimchalo, a doctoral candidate working on the intersection of cultural heritage and legacies of war between Nigeria and Biafra at the Cambridge Center for Heritage Research at the University of Cambridge, while some of the reasons for secession in the 1960s remain, support for secession in southeastern Nigeria is waning.

“Today, the movement is largely driven by the loud voices of the diaspora [aggressive] “The minority is exploiting issues such as unemployment, misinformation and general government incompetence to create an atmosphere of fear,” he said.

“It is a worrying sign that schoolchildren are being affected by these security issues,” Onyimchalo said. “However, it remains unclear how much chaos is being fostered by separatists or other actors often called unidentified militants.”

“I gave up”

Experts say various factors indicate that separatist struggles in both countries are unlikely to succeed.

“First, Cameroon [President] Survive Pia and Nigeria [President] A public analyst based in Yaounde, who requested anonymity due to the Cameroonian escalation, said: “Bola Tinubu is loyal allies of the French and Western governments, and he guarantees their support in the days of violent separatist escalation.” Half the ban On discussing Pia.

In addition, internal fighting between Anglophone separatist groups increased by 83 percent, while targeting of civilians also rose by 83 percent, along with a growing number of armed gangs in southeastern Nigeria, ACLED data showed. With these trends, analysts say that the initial support the separatist fighters got from the people has declined significantly.

“Make no mistake, the separatist ideology still resonates, but no one will keep their future in the hands of violent agitators,” the Yaounde-based analyst said.

In safer parts of Anglophone southwest Cameroon, schools are gradually reopening but remain largely non-functional. In the northwest, local residents and school principals told Al Jazeera that secessionist violence continues to keep most learning centers closed, even as children across the English-speaking regions suffer from poverty, malnutrition and limited access to basic needs.

For Ngoa and his two sisters, education is no longer an option. “I have given up,” he told Al Jazeera, lamenting that in addition to the high cost of basic household supplies, he also bears the additional burden of paying liberation taxes to armed groups.

“I have to work to ensure my family survives, because this place feels like a forgotten and cursed land,” the 17-year-old said.

*Names have been changed or withheld to protect the safety of those who spoke to Al Jazeera.