More than 800,000 residents were forcibly evicted from informal settlements in Abuja, Nigeria, from 2003 to 2007.
Forced evictions still continue in Nigeria, and thousands fear for their homes on a daily basis.
In May 2008, COHRE and the Nigerian organization SERAC (Social and Economic Rights Action Center) released a major report looking at the evictions that occurred during the administration of Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Minister Nasir Ahmad el-Rufai.
In the report, The Myth of the Abuja Master Plan: Forced evictions and urban planning in Abuja, Nigeria, COHRE and SERAC say that Former FCT Minister El-Rufai and Federal Capital Development Authority (FCDA) officials created a myth about the Abuja Master Plan to convince people that the Plan justified and necessitated the systematic violation of the housing rights of hundreds of thousands of people so that Abuja would not become "another Lagos".
COHRE and SERAC urged the government to end destructive and illegal policies and address the dire need for affordable housing in Abuja.
See below to download the fact-finding mission report.
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