‘Men don't have patience’: Sexuality, pleasure and danger in displacement settings in Northcentral Nigeria

ABSTRACT

Sexual and Reproductive Health Rights are fundamental human rights. Previous studies on gender and sexuality in displacement settings have often focused on sexual and gender-based violence and the reproductive health problems of women while underplaying their needs for sexual expression, pleasure and procreation. This paper examines the influence of conflict and displacement on gender relations, sexuality and natality of internally displaced women in Nigeria. It draws on data from a larger study in which focus group discussions and in-depth interviews were used to explore 52 women's gendered experiences with Boko Haram insurgency and displacement. A critical thematic analysis of data revealed that the women's relationships with their men were complex and ambiguous, characterised by both tensions and solidarity. The women saw their men as partners in their struggle against multi-level oppression, including the structural barriers that undermine their mutual sexual expressions and pleasure, as well as their desire to procreate and repopulate their decimated ancestral communities. We recommend collaborative efforts to promote and protect the Sexual and Reproductive Health Rights of displaced women which includes building physical structures and living conditions that promote healthy, safe and pleasurable sexual expressions, and socio-political structures that create access to the long term social security.

KEYWORDS:

• Sexuality
• gender
• internally displaced women
• Boko Haram
• sexualisation

Introduction

The World Health Organisation's (WHO) current working definition of sexual health emphasises physical, mental and social wellbeing in relation to sexuality, and the need for sexual experiences to be pleasurable, safe, and devoid of coercion and violence (World Health Organization [WHO], 2006). It also recognises that sexual health is elusive if sexual rights are not respected, protected and fulfilled. Such rights include, but are not limited to, right to equality and non-discrimination, right to privacy, and right to determine the number and spacing of children (Inter-Agency Working Group (United Nations) [IAWG], 2018; WHO, 2006). Violations in sexual health rights often amount to a violation of reproductive health rights. The Guttmacher-Lancet commission recently revised the definition of sexual and reproductive health rights (SRHR), emphasising the need to include universal access to infertility treatment, treatment of reproductive cancers, detection and prevention of gender-based violence, safe abortion care, and comprehensive sexuality education as essential sexual and reproductive health services (Starrs et al., 2018). One way of translating the Lancet-Guttmacher commission's report into local action is to carry out critical in-depth analyses of local contexts so that local realities and priorities drive action (Ferguson & Desai, 2018).

This paper presents an in-depth analysis of internally displaced women's (IDW) perspectives on their SRHR. The paper draws on the experiences of women who were displaced in Nigeria as a result of the on-going Boko Haram (BH) insurgency. We begin with a brief review of the impact of conflict and displacement on SRHR, identifying gaps in research and short-comings of SRH interventions that target displaced women.

Displacement and SRHR

In 2015, about 65 million persons were displaced from their homes, and 40 million of the displaced persons remained within the borders of their home countries as internally displaced persons (IDPs) (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees [UNHCR], 2015). Approximately one-quarter of people in need of humanitarian assistance in 2015 were women and girls of reproductive age (IAWG, 2018; UNHCR, 2015). New and protracted armed conflicts remain major drivers of human displacement (UNHCR, 2017). TheBH insurgency, which began around 2009 in Nigeria, is one of the conflicts driving the global increase in human displacement. BH is the popular name for an Islamic extremist group that is threatening to topple the Nigerian government and establish an Islamic state (Comolli, 2015; Thurston, 2017). Over six thousand people have died since the beginning of the insurgency (Institute for Economics and Peace, 2015) and over two million people have been internally displaced, 53% of whom are women (International Organization for Migration – Nigeria, 2015).

Conflict and displacement settings have been described as ‘states of exception’, where individuals are stripped of their basic rights and dignity as citizens, and reduced to ‘bare life’ (Agamben, 2005). In such settings, survival challenges, as well as challenges in relationships, sexuality and reproductive health of affected individuals are common (Alzate, 2008; IAWG, 2018; Onyango, 2012). In recognition of continuous violation of SRHR of displaced women, the Inter-Agency Working Group on Reproductive Health in Crises (IAWG) developed, and has consistently updated, the field manual on reproductive health in humanitarian settings (IAWG, 2018). Whereas SRHR is seen as central to the realisation of fundamental human rights, gaps still exist in the extent to which the SRHR of displaced and other marginalised women are protected (IAWG, 2018; Starrs et al., 2018).

The skewed focus of researches and interventions in relation to displaced persons’ SRHR and needs is a contributory factor to the existing gaps. There are myriads of interventions, guidelines and published research (e.g. Casey, Chynoweth, Cornier, Gallagher, & Wheeler, 2015; Casey et al., 2013; Clark, 2017; Finnerty & Shahmanesh, 2016; Freedman, 2016; Meger, 2016; Rosenberg & Bakomeza, 2017; Sami et al., 2014; Schlecht, Rowley, & Babirye, 2013; Steiner et al., 2009) on the prevention and management of the dangers associated with displaced persons’ sexuality, but very little attention is given to their rights to sexual pleasure, and privacy. Issues such as sexual violence, sexually transmitted infections (STIs), unintended pregnancies, maternal and child death, unmet needs for family planning and safe abortion, dominate scholarly literature on displaced women. Some scholars (Ackerson & Zielinski, 2017; Palmer & Storeng, 2016) have raised concerns about the prevalence of pro-natal ideas in displacement settings but very little effort is made to explore women's perspectives on those ideas. Rather, there is emphasis on how to improve the supply of family planning services and provide abortion care (Foster et al., 2017) when there is insufficient evidence that programs that focus on providing family planning services are effective in such settings (Warren, Post, Hossain, Blanchet, & Roberts, 2015). In fact, family planning products such as condoms have been rejected by some displaced people who continue to procreate, despite their poor living conditions (Ackerson & Zielinski, 2017; Alburo-Cañete, 2014). This paper attempts to address these gaps by exploring the influence of conflict and displacement on relationships, sexuality and natality of women who were displaced as a result of the on-going BH insurgency in Nigeria. It explores IDW perspectives on their gendered experiences and shows how women's desires to express their sexuality and assert their reproductive rights, intersect with cultural and socio-economic realities to influence their response to oppressive gender relations in displacement.

Materials and methods

This paper draws on data from a qualitative study conducted with IDW in Northcentral Nigeria. The research received ethical approval from the National Health Research Ethics Committee (NHREC), Nigeria, and the University of Otago Human Ethics Committee, New Zealand. A hermeneutic phenomenological approach, which sits within a constructionist paradigm, was adopted for the study. Constructionism posits that there is no single objective reality out there that can be discovered, described or explained, but that reality is subjective, fluid, relative and socially constructed (Armour, Rivaux, & Bell, 2009; Bryman, 2008). The research was carried out from an insider–outsider position. The first-named author of this paper is a Nigerian citizen and was studying in New Zealand but carried out all the fieldwork in Nigeria. She has in-depth knowledge of most cultures in Northern Nigeria but she has not experienced armed conflict or forceful displacement.

Participants were recruited from informal and NGO-organised camps and host communities in Jos and Abuja, Northcentral Nigeria. Officials of the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) and two NGOs assisted with the identification and recruitment of IDW in Jos, while IDP camp and community leaders facilitated the recruitment of participants from two informal camps and one rural host community in Abuja. The participants were purposively selected to include only women who were affected by the BH insurgency, had been displaced for at least two months, and had volunteered to participate in the study. Potential participants received information sheets that explained the research in detail. Fifty-two IDW aged 15–49 gave written or verbal consent to participate in the study. They were married, widowed and single women. Before displacement, 45 of the women resided in rural communities as farmers or traders. Most of them attained only primary or secondary level education or had no western education. Only four of them had education beyond high school.

Although the majority of IDPs in Nigeria reside in the Northeast region, the study was limited to Northcentral Nigeria where the majority of the IDP population were Christians, hence 44 of the 52 women who participated in the study were Christians. It is also important to note that only 18 of the 52 participants lived with their spouses in displacement. Hence the primary focus of this paper is the gendered experiences of the 18 women who lived with their husbands in displacement, five of whom identified as Muslims.

Data were generated through four focus groups, consisting of 5–7 participants each, and 30 individual in-depth interviews. Discussions were held in English, Hausa, the Nigerian version of Pidgin English, or a combination of the three languages. Women who could only communicate in their local languages were excluded from the study. The discussions lasted between one to three hours and were digitally recorded, and later transcribed. The possible physical and emotional risks associated with both conducting and participating in research about traumatic experiences were considered in the planning and execution of this research (Liamputtong, 2007). In order to ensure participants’ physical and emotional safety, interviews and focus groups were conducted in safe venues of participants’ choices, since they had better knowledge of the study environment. Most of them chose their homes, safe locations in their camp environments, or nearby school buildings for the discussions. The sensitivity of the research topic also required a high level of sensitivity and empathy to the emotional needs and responses of the participants (Campbell, Adams, Wasco, Ahrens, & Sefl, 2010). They were informed of their right to discuss only what they felt comfortable to talk about, and to end the discussions any time they wished to. They were supported through any emotional difficulty they expressed and were encouraged to take their time and wait until they were more comfortable to continue the discussions. Relevant information concerning displacement, war-related trauma and gender-based violence was also provided to the participants as Campbell et al. (2010) recommended. Links to appropriate support services provided by NGOs within their communities were given to them in case they needed further support following the interviews. Efforts were also made to maintain anonymity and confidentiality of participants’ information, and all participants received the sum of four thousand Naira (an equivalent of NZ$20) in appreciation of their contribution to the research.

A contextualised critical thematic approach to analysis of the data was carried out. This allowed for the exploration of the ‘underlying ideas, assumptions and conceptualizations’ (Braun & Clarke, 2006, p. 84) that shaped or informed participants’ understandings and interpretations of their experiences. The aim of the analysis was not to uncover the truthfulness or coherence of the women's stories but to gain useful insights into their experiences in line with their broader socio-cultural and structural realities. Therefore participants’ socio-cultural contexts, existing literature and theoretical concepts from Black American and African feminism, and a range of womanist thinking were used as interpretive tools.

There are subtle differences among black feminist, indigenous African feminist and womanist thinking but they all take women's lived experiences as the legitimate point of departure for analysing and producing knowledge about women of colour (Collins, 2000). They also adopt the concept of intersectionality in studying and addressing women's oppression. Intersectionality looks beyond the effect of gender, to capture how other social factors such as ethnicity, social class, sexual orientation, education and social identity contribute to women's marginalised or privileged positions (Crenshaw, 1989). They also eschew antagonism towards men, seeing men as partners in their struggle for liberation (Collins, 2000; Hudson-Weems, 2000; Mekgwe, 2008; Nnaemeka, 2004). Both African and Africana womanists (Hudson-Weems, 1995; Ogunyemi, 1985) emphasise the use of indigenous African cultural and religious values, which emphasise communality and family centredness, as tools for understanding and addressing gender inequality among people of African descent.

Findings

BH insurgency and subsequent displacement engendered livelihood challenges, and disruption of normative gender roles. This produced tensions in the IDW's relationships with their male partners. We use the term ‘disruption of normative gender roles’ because ‘changes in gender roles’ fails to capture the lived experiences of the women in this study. The women reported combining their traditional feminine roles with most of the masculine roles while receiving very little or no support from the men. The central issues in the tensions were men's unemployment, their sexual relationships, and their desires for more children. The complexities embedded in those tensions, the multi-level factors that influence the women's relationships with their men, and the subtle ways in which the women expressed their sexual needs and asserted their SRHR constitute the main focus of this section.

‘Our men do spoil’: Men's unemployment and behavioural changes

Due to an inability to secure formal employment or gain access to farmlands, men were unable to perform their culturally assigned breadwinner roles. The participants and their families were displaced from patriarchal communities where men were revered as heads of households. However, it is known that traditional, especially African, constructions of ideal masculinities, which position men as economically independent, physically strong and sexually virile, are often challenged in difficult situations such as war and displacement (Affleck, Thamotharampillai, Jeyakumar, & Whitley, 2018; Hollander, 2014; Jaji, 2009; Lwambo, 2013; Oldenburg, 2015; Onyango, 2012; Schulz, 2018). To ensure the survival of their families, the women sought informal employment. Some of them engaged in trading of cooked food or handicrafts, or worked as domestic servants, and eventually became their family breadwinners in addition to their homemaking and childcare roles. Nevertheless, the women still held on to traditional ideas about gender roles and saw their men as ‘failed men’. Attributes such as idle, spoilt, unrealistic, or unsupportive were often ascribed to the men. They seemed to hold on to traditional values of husbands as breadwinners and resented that they had to take on menial jobs to compensate for their lack of contribution to the household. Even though they were sensitive to the impact displacement had had on their men, they expected them to adjust and adapt to the situation in much the same way that they had. In one of the focus groups, participants discussed how the men in their camp, sat and played games (cards) all day, while women went out to ‘beg for work’.

You see, the woman is the one going out. Inside here [in this camp]. You will see our men sitting. None of them goes so that they will be employed as labourers like this. Their place of stay is there [They always sit in the camp]. In the mornings, they will be there, and they will be [gestures with hand to signify motions of playing cards], one! … two! … [They will be playing cards all day]. They are idle! (Asabe)

Another participant added:

Them, it is like they are ashamed to go and do [demonstrates door knocking] kon kon. [They are ashamed to go and knock on people's doors to beg for work] (Adah)

According to the participants, some men masked their failures and inability to cope with the challenges of displacement by being physically violent, especially towards their wives, excessive alcohol intake, womanising or even marrying more wives. Benedict narrated how spoilt her husband had become.

… Now … our men don spoil [have spoilt]. No money, no work. Like me now, my husband, I never understand which kind character hin¹ be [I no longer understand the kind of person he is]. Before, he get [had] money, hin dey sell [he was selling] fish. … But now, he has no money. Wahala don dey [problem has come] [claps hands in exasperation]. Hin de drink [He is drinking], doing somehow! [Misbehaving]. So, this condition … no be [is not] good condition. Na [it is] Bad condition. (Benedict)

Excessive alcohol consumption and violent behaviour is common among men in displacement settings (Lwambo, 2013; Roberts et al., 2014; Roberts, Ocaka, Browne, Oyok, & Sondorp, 2011; Weaver & Roberts, 2010). Women in post-war Uganda also used the word, ‘spoilt’ to describe their men, who were reportedly ‘stranded’ as a result of severe hardship, and unemployment, and thus failed to make good judgements (Onyango, 2012). The term, ‘spoilt’ as used by the women in this study implies damage. In line with the thought of Hudson-Weems (1995), Benedict, in the above account, demonstrated an understanding of how BH insurgency, displacement and unemployment had damaged her man who was previously a successful businessman. Generally, the participants revealed their sensitivity to the plight of their men through their resolution to stay with them and continue to support them. This is despite the men's apparent lack of support and the fact that some women were being pressurised by other ‘rich men’ to engage in extra-marital affairs. Sansanatu, who was in a polygamous relationship narrated how her husband, who could not provide for his two wives and six children, added another wife in displacement in order to ‘help himself. According to her, she and her co-wife remained ‘patient’ until the new wife eventually left.

He [our husband] got married in this town … but the woman was not living in this camp [laughing] … even the marriage, aunty, I am telling you, they did not last for three months [laughing] … The woman is even older than both of us [my co-wife and myself] but she married him because she wanted a man and he, he wanted a house. When they come here, they will just be making faces for us, and abusing us [verbal abuse] … she had no respect for us. We said “we, we are here, we are not going anywhere, since Allah is not sleeping, He is the one that can do everything for us”. We were patient aunty, and we gained the reward of patience. (Sansanatu)

Benedict also narrated how she invoked Holy Ghost fire to consume a rich man who wanted to have an affair with her.

One man come meet me say … hin go [he will] give me money … hin go go [and] sleep with me … because hin see my husband no get anything [just because he saw that my husband is poor]. I tell am say “God forbid bad thing. The time wey I dey for village, my husband get work. Hin dey do business … every problem I get hin dey solve for me. But now as we enter condition, my husband no get work, me I no get money you come tell me say you wan come sleep with me”. I tell am say, “Holy Ghost fire! I no go go [I will not go]”. (Benedict)

A culture that expects women to be silent in oppressive gender relations, poverty, and women's economic dependence on men have been used to explain women's risks and tolerance for intimate partner violence (Burgess & Campbell, 2015; Campbell & Mannell, 2016; Collins, 2000; Ertürk & Purkayastha, 2012; Hynes et al., 2016; Njiru, 2014; Nnaemeka, 2004). However, the narratives and overall experiences of the women in this study reveal much more. In addition to religio-cultural norms and beliefs, their sexual relationships with the men, their future expectations, and the demographic realities of their ancestral (pre-displacement) communities intersected with the structural violence they encountered in displacement to influence their responses to oppressive gender relations and intimate partner violence. The women related to their men as their partners in the same struggle against BH and what they perceived as government's neglect and insensitivity to their plight. ‘The government does not know us’ was Briskilla's way of describing their relationship with the government. This is similar to how women, who were supposedly victims of the insurgency, because BH abducted them, preferred to align with the insurgents rather than support a government that neglected and oppressed them (Matfess, 2017).

These women's solidarity and support for the men was necessary for several reasons. One of them is their quest to secure prestigious social standing and family inheritance for their children who will be their primary old-age support in the absence of government-funded care and support for the elderly (Olaore, Ogunlade, & Aham-Chiabuotu, 2016). In addition, BH attacks threatened to annihilate, and eventually produced negative demographic changes in, the women's pre-displacement communities. The insurgents targeted and killed men and boys over the age of 14, and abducted younger boys for indoctrination and radicalisation. It was therefore expedient for the women to protect and support the surviving men in order to ensure future survival and stability of their communities. Within the heteronormative culture of Northern Nigeria, women's sexual relationships with men are the only socially acceptable means of ensuring procreation and repopulation of their mostly decimated communities. Most importantly, the women depended on the surviving men to meet their own sexual needs, especially considering the cultural stigma and religious sanctions associated with extra-marital affairs and transactional sex (Ntoimo & Isiugo-Abanihe, 2014). The next two subsections discuss the complexities of the women's sexual relationships with their men, highlighting the ambivalence associated with their responses towards what they described as shameless sexual expression among their men. Underlying the women's narratives of their displeasure about men's sexual behaviours were expressions of mutual concern for sexual privacy, pleasure, and freedom to express their SRHR.

‘Men don't have patience’: Sexual relationships in displacement

The IDW and their families lived in crowded housing conditions. In the informal camps they lived in shacks, made of tarpaulins without windows and concrete floors. Those in NGO-organised camps lived in concrete buildings but each household was allocated only one single room, irrespective of the number of persons in the household. Those in urban host communities lived in dilapidated buildings in slums, while those in rural settings shared houses with host families. Zara, an eighteen-year-old participant said ‘we are ten, with my daddy and my mummy. We are ten. Only one room! We need room’.

Such crowded housing conditions afforded limited or no sexual privacy for the women and their partners but, according to the women, some of their men demanded sex without considering their limited privacy. In addition to being a source of embarrassment to them, they believed that sexual activities while having their children in the same room (either awake or asleep) had resulted in the sexualisation of IDP children, and loss of their parental authority. In an individual interview, Angela talked about the loss of parental authority due to lack of sexual privacy in their camp.

It is not easy ooo … some men do not have patience … that is why they just do what they want to do [they just have sex ], and you now see children coming up with some behaviours … If they see their mothers, there is no respect … even their fathers, no respect. (Angela)

Asabe described men's demand for sex without regard for children's presence as acts of shamelessness.

You see, men they don't have shame. Yes! Even in the midst of his children, even before them, those that do not have self-control will do it with their wives there. They are teaching children iskanci [extremely bad behaviour or irresponsibility]. (Asabe)

Mary introduced herself as the women's leader in one of the camps. She spoke of how she had confronted a woman whose daughter of about five years old was caught arranging sexual partners for other children as part of their play. The following data excerpt shows her discussion with the girl's mother. The girl's mother attributed her daughter's behaviour to her husband's ‘lack of patience’.

I say, “how comes this your girl know man and woman sleep [sex]?”. She say “I don’t know what am going to tell you. See the room … He sleeps in the house. We sleep together. Even [before] the children sleep, he will started disturb me anyhow [he will be demanding sex] … How can I do? Maybe, she is looking [watching] me and him [her] father … I am telling him … “don’t do this thing in front of this children, wait, let them sleep”. He will not agree. See, he beat me because I said no”. (Mary)

While it was not possible in this study to explore men's perspectives regarding their behaviours, a number of studies have shown that men tend to assert their ‘manhood’ by hyper sexuality, especially when their traditional constructions of ideal manhood are challenged (Onyango, 2012; Schulz, 2018). Men also associate control of women's sexuality with ‘real manhood’ in some African settings (Jaji, 2009; Schulz, 2018). Women's attempt to control their sexual lives in displacement was interpreted as a challenge to men's authority among IDPs in Uganda (Okello & Hovil, 2007; Stark et al., 2010). Since ‘real manhood’ is associated with men's ability to protect, provide and procreate, or at least ‘perform’ sexually (Schulz, 2018), it is therefore possible that the men were intent on asserting and exercising their sexuality, which was the only marker of ‘real manhood’ that was left to them in displacement. As men, they could neither protect their families from BH attacks nor provide for them in displacement. Mary reported attempting to discuss women's concerns about sexualisation of children in camps with the men, and that some of the men responded with expressions like: ‘How can we not sleep with our wives? Just because we are in this condition?’

Notably, none of the participants interpreted men's sexual demands as sexual violence. To them, it was simply a display of ‘shamelessness’ and ‘impatience’, which had resulted in children's sexualisation. These women's minimisation of their men's sexual behaviour reflects a general belief that there is no such thing as sexual violence or rape in marital relationships in many African communities (McCleary-Sills et al., 2016; Ola & Johnson, 2013). Within that cultural context, it was also more socially acceptable for the women to project the sexuality of the men as problematic, while appearing to underplay their own sexuality in terms of their desires and needs. However, further probes revealed that the women's narratives were indirect expressions of their mutual concerns for sexual privacy. Some women intertwined their sexual needs with those of their men. They lamented the fact that their sexual experiences were non-pleasurable.

It is not enjoyable now! It's causing the problem. The man is not patient … she go out [he will go after other women]. (Angela)

To them, pleasurable sexual experiences were necessary for their personal satisfaction and as a means of keeping their men from going after other women. Some of them gave hints about how they managed to meet their sexual needs.

We are not enjoying. This thing is very very [extremely] bad … We are just managing. If the children sleep, we go sleep [will have sex] with our husband. And if the children go yawo, [go out to play] we go sleep. (Zainab)

Such sexual experiences were often marked by anxiety that the children would wake up or return from their play unexpectedly. The temperature within their tents also posed another barrier to sexual pleasure, especially for those who lived in tarpaulin tents in Abuja.

You know men, if he cannot satisfy himself, there will be no peace. But even we the womens, we need to have time with our oga [husband]. That’s how God created us. But the place we are living is not very conducive … Sometime … the women want to meet with her husband, you can’t meet with him. [it] is so difficult … Because the inside is so hot. I’m telling you, the inside is very hot. You know something of nylon now … it can attract heat. (Alheri)

Alheri pathologised her experience of lack of sexual satisfaction. She believed that lack of sexual satisfaction caused abdominal pains for her.

A person like me, if I want to meet with [have sex with] my husband, and I didn't meet with him … my stomach will start paining me. So sometimes I have to, even with the children there … [Responding to my surprised look] Yes, Why not? How can we do aunty? (Alheri)

Protection of children is central in African motherhood, and it is common for African women to place their children's needs over theirs (Chilisa, 2012; Chilisa & Ntseane, 2010; Collins, 2000; Hudson-Weems, 1995) but there was a limit to how far the women in this study could go in protecting their children, and by extension their personal dignity and that of their partners. They juggled the responsibilities of meeting their men's sexual demands as well as their own sexual needs, and protecting their children, under highly unconducive housing conditions. Failure to protect their children created a sense of guilt, helplessness and failed motherhood among the women, especially when children's engagement in socially unacceptable sexual behaviours could be linked directly or indirectly to their own sexual expression.

‘We want to born plenty’: Asserting reproductive rights in displacement

Many of the women in camps and other settings either had very young children, or were pregnant. This was despite their poor living conditions and the fact that some health organisations periodically visited the camps and offered family planning services to them. Some women reported that the men wanted more children and prevented women from accepting contraceptives. However, it was evident from the women's accounts that they did not contest men's desire for more children but their lack of support in raising the children.

You know, the problem is that womens, we are the ones suffering with the children. The men duty is to give us the belle [impregnate us], that's all. If you deliver a child, you can do this … do that … [you will be responsible] for the children. Them, they will fold the hand and be looking at you. But when you say okay, let me rest now, let me do the family planning, it will cause problem between you and your husband. (Alheri)

The women were not necessarily victims of men's desire for more children but the pro-natal ideas were shared by both men and women in the camps and other settlements. Some women said they needed to give birth to more children in order to replace family members who were killed during BH attacks. Many of the women also lost their own children during their flights and in displacement. Replacing their children and repopulating their communities was a major concern to them, and they were not willing to accept contraceptives until they had done so.

They [health workers] want people to take family planning [but] they [we] don't want to take family planning because “our people wey plenty [many of our people], the Boko Haram kill them. We want to born plenty. Because that people wey we lose, we go return am [we will replace the people we lost] … before we agree to carry [do] family planning” … That’s why we are … borning pikin [having babies], and some, they are dying without [because there is] no hospital here. (Benedict)

Getting pregnant and having more children can therefore be seen as a way of asserting their reproductive rights, especially their rights to decide on the number of their children, and the timing of their births. It was also resistance to what they perceived as health care providers’ insensitivity to their concern over their almost-decimated communities. From the women's perspectives, the health workers provided partial reproductive health services as they promoted family planning but failed to provide antenatal and delivery services or emergency obstetrics care.

In post-genocide Rwanda, there was a decline in the use of birth control and slight increase in the fertility rate, and women were more likely to have other children after the genocide if they lost a son or a brother in the conflict (Schindler, Schindler, & Brück, 2011). Although the IDW in Nigeria did not discuss the influence of gender on their choice to continue procreation in displacement, it is possible that desire to replace the males, who were mostly killed in the insurgency, significantly influenced the pro-natal ideas. Their decision to keep having children in displacement further reveals the complexity of gender relations among women of African descent, who often resist oppression in concert with their men (Hudson-Weems, 1995). While being fully conscious of their health risks and the burdens of caring for children without support, the women aligned with their men in the struggle against BH's ethnic cleansing agenda. They could not physically fight the insurgents but they could use their reproductive capabilities to counter their plans. This is one example of how African women indirectly show resistance to external oppression even when they appear to be participants in their own oppression (Collins, 2000). It is also an expression of a life lived beyond the self, in solidarity with both the living and the dead (Dillard, 2008), and their active involvement in ensuring community survival (Muwati & Gambahaya, 2012). It is possible that their stance was inspired by a popular Hausa proverb: ‘Arzikin jamaa ya fi arzikin wadata’ (‘to be rich in people is better than to be rich in material possessions’). A similar notion was raised by a refugee man in Uganda who stated that ‘a man without people is poor and a poor man has no voice’ (Onyango, 2012, p. 20). Hence the priority of the women in this study, in line with their cultural conceptions of what it means to be rich, was to have more people. To them, whatever material lack they suffered in displacement could be remedied in the future if they had people.

Conclusion

This paper foregrounds the influence of broader cultural, socio-economic and structural factors on women's sexual experiences and SRHR within heterosexual relationships. Primarily, the paper shows how inadequate household income and housing conditions relate to SRHR violations. It underscores IDW's needs for, and rights to, sexual privacy, pleasurable sexual experiences and autonomy in deciding the number of children they want, and the timing of their births.

Although normal family life is often disrupted in displacement, it is dehumanising to assume that adult displaced persons, or people undergoing traumatic life events should not desire pleasurable sexual expression. Such dehumanising assumptions about displaced persons’ sexuality are hardly expressed openly, but the continued neglect of their housing conditions reflects it. It is also common to address sexualisation of children in displacement settings in terms of child trafficking for prostitution, and sexual abuse by other people outside their immediate families (Pittaway, 2008), without giving attention to how displaced persons’ housing and adult sexuality contribute to the sexualisation of children. A systematic review of interventions aimed at preventing Violence Against Women (VAW) and Violence Against Children (VAC) in humanitarian settings (Asghar, Rubenstein, & Stark, 2017) shows that while several interventions have focused on changing social norms regarding gender, few have given attention to strengthening the household economy and improving livelihoods of affected families. Only one of the reviewed interventions considered the importance of the built environment in preventing household violence. The assumption that displacement is a short term emergency situation (Laurie & Petchesky, 2008) warranting short term adjustment under unconducive housing situations, can no longer hold. Displacements are now known to become long term situations, lasting for up to 17 years for refugees (IAWG, 2018). Hence addressing the SRHR of displaced persons as an issue that is unconnected to their overall living and housing conditions is no longer acceptable.

The dehumanising assumptions about displaced persons’ sexuality also contribute to the ways in which family planning and birth control are articulated and promoted in their settlements. While the impact of living conditions such as housing on overall maternal health outcomes of displaced women are ignored, there is heightened interest in providing them with direct family planning services (Kidman, Palermo, & Bertrand, 2015; Palmer & Storeng, 2016; Tunçalp et al., 2015; West, Isotta-Day, Ba-Break, & Morgan, 2017). This focus on direct health services presumes that women's sexuality is a biomedical issue, devoid of socio-cultural and political implications (Alburo-Cañete, 2014). It is also common to simply accept that women are hindered from accepting family planning services by their men, or that they are pressurised by their culture to give birth to more children in such settings (Ackerson & Zielinski, 2017; Palmer & Storeng, 2016). Such ways of thinking tend to underplay women's agency to determine what is best for them, considering their broader social realities. They also fail to give attention to what having more children mean to the women themselves, and ignore how structural factors, such as lack of old-age social security, and therefore reliance on children to provide in old age, inadvertently promote pro-natal ideals in conflict and displacement settings.

Spronk (2005) observed that women often take the responsibility for reproducing patriarchal social structures, but Apusigah (2008) argues that women's actions, inactions and reactions, as custodians of oppressive patriarchal systems, stem from their need to be trusted gatekeepers and not necessarily as a result of conviction. Evidence from this study shows that Apusigah’s (2008) argument might represent oversimplification of a complex issue. The women's willingness to undergo high-risk pregnancies in order to repopulate their communities serves something more than a need to act as trusted gatekeepers.

This paper is not an attempt to explain or justify oppressive gender relations, sexual and physical violence, or any other form of violence by men against women. It is also not an attempt to essentialise the experiences of IDW in Nigeria. Given that this is a qualitative study, the aim is also not to generalise the findings to all IDW. The findings are limited in that the research draws primarily on the perspectives of women living in a few selected IDP settings, whose experiences and perspectives may differ from those of men, or other IDW in other IDP settings. However, this paper helps shed light on the complexity of gender relations. It also calls attention to the multiple intersecting factors that enable oppressive gender relations in displacement situations, and sometimes, render them less problematic to the women who experience them. For the women in this study, oppressive gender relations were tolerated as lesser evil in the midst of other destructive challenges that put their lives and future at risk. This paper recommends a holistic approach to protecting and promoting the SRHR of IDW which also involves protection of their children's sexuality. This approach includes efforts to address the problem of unemployment among displaced men, and multisector and collaborative approaches that will integrate provision of appropriate housing for IDP households into programs that promote their SRHR. The current move towards the expansion of the definition of SRHR and accompanying services is a welcome idea, but we must also give attention to the environments in which the sexual acts occur in order to make them safe, and pleasurable for women and their partners. Therefore, NGOs and other actors involved in IDP support should seriously consider building low-cost houses in secure locations for IDP families. The IDPs could be employed to work in the construction and maintenance of those houses, depending on their skills, and the houses could be converted to other uses when and if the displaced persons return to their ancestral communities. A holistic approach towards the protection of IDW's SRHR also requires political will to ensure improved social support services for the elderly so that total dependence on children for old-age support will be minimised. In other words, both physical structures and living conditions that promote healthy, safe and pleasurable sexual expression, and socio-political structures that create access to long term social security, are equally important for improving the health and social outcomes of women and children in displacement.

Acknowledgement

We acknowledge the administrations of Babcock University, Nigeria, and the University of Otago, New Zealand for giving scholarships that funded this research. We also acknowledge the support of the Internally Displaced Women in Nigeria who accepted to participate in this research.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 Hin in pidgin English can be used as a masculine or feminine pronoun, that is, he or she.