SPECIAL APPELLATION OR SPECIAL CARE?
A QUANTITATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE CHALLENGES FACING DEVELOPMENT-INDUCED INTERNALLY DISPLACED PERSONS IN OGUN STATE, NIGERIA
Urban renewal is usually a government-sanctioned exercise to clean up decaying portions of cities. Following unintended
negative consequences like internal displacements arising from the exercise in developing countries, scholars call for naming
those displaced by it “special categories of IDPs” to receive humanitarian assistance like those displaced by conflicts. This
research aims to examine the challenges faced by development-induced IDPs in Ogun State, South-West Nigeria. About 420
adult IDPs who have had either their houses or shops demolished were randomly selected from two purposively chosen
Local Government Areas (LGAs): Abeokuta North and Ado-Odo/Ota out of the five LGAs where massive urban renewal
took place recently. Logistic regression results showed significant relationships between those forcefully displaced and
occupational, income as well as health consequences. Traders, for instance, are three times more likely to lose customers and
subsequently close business than civil servants who are the reference category in the regression results ( OR= 3.0; P< 0.001).
Results also show a significant relationship between forced migrants and symptoms of depression arising from displacement
through urban renewal because those affected were 12.8 times more likely to be depressed than those who were not displaced
(RC=12.8; P<0.001). We recommend that in future similar exercise, the better and lasting solution is to compensate
development-induced IDPs commensurately rather than calling them names that do not solve their problems
