“Yarankowane” Children Belong to Everyone: Nigeria report on Kinship Care

Children without Appropriate Care (CwAC) is a priority area for Save the Children’s child protection work for the period 2010-2015. In working toward this priority, Save the Children embarked on a multi-country participatory research initiative from 2012-2013. This was undertaken to build knowledge on alternative care practices, especially informal kinship care, prevalent in the West and Central Africa. Nigeria and three other countries were involved in this regional research; the other countries are Niger, Sierra Leone and Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

This study finds that kinship care is quite prevalent in Nigeria and largely informal. The research revealed a gap on legal and policy frameworks concerning informal and kinship care: there are no national laws or policies regarding informal care, including kinship care. There is a perception in the Nigerian government that, based on African culture, families take in relatives in cases of death, economic crisis, etc. and thus the government does not need to interfere. This study presents the positive and negative aspects of a kinship care system that is normalized, yet informal.

The report concludes with policy and practice recommendations to better support the care and protection of children in families and family-based care in Nigeria.