The Critical Role of Grassroots Women in Nigerian Peace and Security

On 12 August 2026, the Netherlands Embassy hosted a panel discussion at EU House, Abuja, featuring YouPaD delegates Lois Felix Bishio and Sophie Chika. The event disseminated Youth Pulse Survey findings showing 73% of Nigerian youth consider migration (Japa), yet 85.5% are retainable through improved domestic opportunities. Key priority areas include migration/brain drain, youth safety, food insecurity, employment barriers, and the consultation-to-implementation gap in governance.

The 2021–2025 NAPGCC implementation cycle suffered from systemic institutional bottlenecks: low stakeholder awareness, absent dedicated budget lines, no federal coordination secretariat, and severe data deficits in sex-disaggregated monitoring. NAPGCC 2.0 (2027–2031) addresses these gaps through three new priority sectors (Education, Technology, Humanitarian Affairs), a National Gender & Climate Data Observatory, mandated climate financing lines, and sub-national implementation windows across six geo-political zones.

The Earth Day 2026 convening, themed 'Our Power, Our Planet: Turning Plastic into Possibilities,' highlighted circular economy opportunities in Nigeria and Sub-Saharan Africa, with a focus on youth entrepreneurship in plastic recycling. Key findings include the recovery of 300,000+ kg of PET plastic by CycleX Africa, a projected $350 billion circular economy opportunity by 2030, and policy advocacy around the NESREA 2024 Plastic Waste Management Act. Panel discussions emphasized mindset shifts from waste as pollution to waste as economic opportunity, practical entry points for youth, required health and safety measures, and major entrepreneurial challenges including limited finance access and unstable policy environments.

Nigeria's civic space is facing increasing pressure from sophisticated legal, digital, and bureaucratic restrictions that undermine constitutional rights. These evolving tactics, which include the securitization of dissent and targeting of accountability agents, are eroding democratic accountability and fostering a climate of self-censorship. The brief outlines these threats and provides a strategic roadmap for democratic actors to defend civic freedoms.

In the Niger Delta, climate change is a threat multiplier, escalating environmental degradation from decades of oil extraction into a primary driver of regional insecurity. This brief finds that the crisis is fueling local conflicts and widening inequalities. It advocates for an immediate policy shift towards a rights-based climate security agenda, institutional accountability, and a framework for reparative justice to mitigate instability.

The Niger Delta is facing irreversible ecological collapse from decades of intensive oil exploitation compounded by climate change threats, leading to severe human rights violations. This report analyzes the systemic environmental destruction, contrasting ineffective corporate 'net-zero' policies with actionable, community-led solutions focused on remediation, resource stewardship, and local sovereignty. It presents a policy agenda advocating for an immediate halt to gas flaring, corporate-financed cleanup, and the decentralization of environmental governance.