VZCZCXRO4044
RR RUEHMA RUEHPA
DE RUEHNM #0714/01 1421247
ZNR UUUUU ZZH ZDK CCP
R 221247Z MAY 07
FM AMEMBASSY NIAMEY
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 3504
INFO RUEHZK/ECOWAS COLLECTIVE
RUEHFR/AMEMBASSY PARIS 0530

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 NIAMEY 000714 
 
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C O R R E C T E D  C O P Y --ADDED SIPDIS CAPTION 
 
SIPDIS 
 
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AFRICA WATCHER; ACCRA PASS TO WARP 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV PHUM KWMN SOCI EAID SMIG NG
SUBJECT: COLD CASE: SHARI'A AND THE MIGRATION OF VICE 
 
NIAMEY 00000714  001.2 OF 002 
 
 
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SUMMARY 
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¶1.  Open-source reporting and some academic studies have 
suggested that the imposition of Shari'a in northern Nigeria 
led to an exodus of prostitutes, petty criminals, and bar 
owners to the southern frontier zones of Niger. Nigerien 
Hausaland, these reports suggested, saw a considerable 
increase in petty crime, promiscuity, and the potential for 
HIV/AIDS and STD transmission due to the baleful influences 
of its larger neighbor. Poloff tested this thesis during a 
recent trip through southern Niger and found that the flow, 
perhaps exaggerated to begin with, had quickly ebbed as 
Nigerians learned to live with (and around) Shari'a. While 
the "big story" was a flop, there is a less dramatic but more 
important story to be told. International NGOs in Niger are 
rightly concerned about HIV/AIDS transmission, but for more 
traditional reasons. Trucking routes and seasonal labor 
migration ("exode") toward the coast bring HIV to Nigerien 
Hausaland, leading to localized prevalence rates of almost 
twenty-five percent, even as Niger's national prevalence rate 
remains low, at 0.7 percent. NGO interventions in the 
southern part of the region of Tahoua - a key exode zone and 
transshipment point - are attempting to contain these pockets 
and the poverty induced practices that create them. END 
SUMMARY 
 
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PROBLEMS OF PROXIMITY OR POVERTY?: 
TRADE, AIDS, AND SHARI'A IN HAUSALAND 
------------------------------------ 
 
¶2.  In a February 2, 2001 piece for the New York Times, 
journalist Norimitsu Onishi argued that the adoption of 
Shari'a in nine northern Nigerian states had pushed "hundreds 
of prostitutes, gamblers and bar owners" over the border into 
quiet Nigerien farming towns. Onishi's piece was cited by 
Northeastern University political science professor and Niger 
specialist William F. S. Miles in a 2004 "Africa Today" 
article entitled "Shari'a as De-Africanization: Evidence from 
Hausaland." Miles noted that "state ratification of Shari'a 
in Northern Nigeria has'...'led borderline market communities 
to peddle goods, services, and pastimes (alcohol, 
prostitution, gambling) that have been now criminalized in 
nearby Nigeria." And "some border towns and villages in Niger 
have become havens for newly criminalized activities in 
Nigeria, especially drinking, gambling, and prostitution." 
Within the scope of the limited media and academic attention 
accorded Niger, the issue of Shari'a and the export of 
Nigerian vice to Niger had become a big story. 
 
¶3.  Traveling in Hausaland (specifically the southern 
departments of the Nigerien administrative regions of Tahoua, 
Maradi, and Zinder) today, Poloff discovered that the 
migration of vice suggested by Miles and Onishi was real 
enough, but also temporary. As Nigeria's Shari'a states 
become more comfortable in their new legal skin, old habits 
picked back up, and creative locals found ways around 
Shari'a's proscriptions. Boube Souley, the Director of the 
National Police in Maradi, confirmed that his border city had 
seen an up-tick in prostitution and vice during the early 
years of Shari'a, but noted that prostitutes and others had 
gone back to Nigeria after "a couple of years," when they 
discovered that the application of Shari'a was less intense 
in practice than in theory. Souley claimed that Nigerian 
Imams thought Shari'a would heighten their power, but in 
practice the army and police still held the cards. Secular 
authorities, he claimed, allowed some cases to go to the 
Shari'a courts, but withheld others. Even the Shari'a courts, 
it is widely believed, are thoroughly corruptible. Souley's 
perception, from across the border, was that Shari'a's impact 
had been vitiated by politics and corruption. Sensing this, 
most Nigerian Shari'a refugees" packed up and went home years 
ago. 
 
¶4.  Souley's impressions were confirmed elsewhere in 
Hausaland. The Prefect of Magaria, a border town 130km north 
of Kano, noted that his department had seen a brief increase 
in prostitution and vice, followed by a rapid decline. To the 
north, the Zinder police chief said the same. In Birni 
N'Konni, three kilometers north of the border, Judge Hamza 
Assoumana Bayere denied that Shari'a had any impact on local 
vice. He noted that Konni, a prominent border crossing and 
transshipment point, had always had a problem with 
prostitution but the problem had not worsened over time. 
Mayors, police officers, public administrators, and 
traditional chiefs in cities (Zinder, Maradi, Birni N'Konni) 
and villages (Sassoumbroum, Kantche) were quick to highlight 
the differences between them and their southern neighbors. 
None considered Nigeria origin vice to be a problem. 
 
NIAMEY 00000714  002.2 OF 002 
 
 
 
¶5.  The NGO Cooperation for American Relief Everywhere 
(CARE), is concerned about prostitution and HIV/AIDS 
transmission along the border, but for a different and more 
traditional set of reasons. Southern Tahoua region, of which 
Konni is the principal city, has long been famous for "exode" 
or seasonal economic migration toward coastal West Africa. 
Returnees are often HIV positive. Konni is also one of the 
largest entry points for long-distance trucks traversing 
Niger, and the trucking corridor extends north through Tahoua 
region for 300km on the way to Agadez and the Mahgreb. CARE 
is starting a new project targeting "exodants" in both Niger 
and Cote D'Ivoire. In Niger, the focus is on Bouza, Illela, 
Tahoua city, and Birni N'Konni. This large triangle takes up 
most of southern Tahoua Region. Prevalence rates among target 
populations within the zone are estimated to be as high as 
23.1%, compared to a national rate of only 0.7% - the lowest 
in Africa - and a Tahoua regional rate of 1.0%. CARE's 
project will encourage testing, and include an 
anti-discrimination and anti-stigmatization campaign for HIV 
positive prostitutes, truck drivers, and exodants and their 
families. Victims' medical needs will also be met. 
 
¶6.  CARE workers in Konni expressed two concerns to Poloff 
during a May 7 visit. While they agreed that Nigerian 
prostitutes had both come and gone in the early years of 
Shari'a they noted that a new phenomenon had appeared at 
around the time of the initial influx. Nigerien girls in 
Konni had begun to engage in occasional prostitution, often 
with just one partner who was usually a truck driver. CARE 
workers noted that this group was harder to access than 
career prostitutes, as they "live hidden." Demographic 
information was likewise difficult to come by, though the 
team noted that they were studying this problem more closely. 
The eastern Nigerien Region of Diffa was likewise a cause for 
concern. CARE staff claimed that Diffa is emerging as a new 
high-risk area for HIV/AIDS. They suggested several possible 
causes for this, including the movement of persons and drugs 
by traffickers, who exploit Diffa's thinly-populated, poorly 
policed tracks to head north from Chad or Nigeria to Libya. 
They also cited instability along the Chadian border and the 
cross-border movement of persons, particularly nomadic 
"Mahamid" Arabs in search of pasture. NOTE: The current 
estimate for HIV prevalence in Diffa is 1.7% of the overall 
population. END NOTE 
 
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COMMENT: THE "LITTLE" STORY 
TRUMPS THE "BIG" ONE 
--------------------------- 
 
¶7.  The concerns of today's NGO workers and government 
authorities have little to do with what appears to have been 
a temporary and abnormal influx of Nigerian vice into Niger 
after the adoption of Shari'a.  Rather, the focus is on 
fundamentals related to poverty and the dangerous practices 
that it sometimes encourages. Exode by single men; occasional 
prostitution by young girls; human trafficking and 
immigration toward Europe and the Mahgreb; and, nomads 
searching for scarce pasture pose the real risks to public 
health and stability in Niger. All are poverty induced 
practices. While the limited media attention Niger receives 
often draws attention to the dramatic and exceptional "big 
story," one can say the country's real challenges have more 
pedestrian origins. 
ALLEN