Delivering pregnancy help and saving lives can look quite different depending on the particular part of the world at hand, whether there is poverty, violence, or other exploitation of women. Nigeria is a place from which heartbreaking headlines come regularly.
Southeastern Nigeria and the South are majority Christian, while northern Nigeria is majority Muslim. Violent Muslim insurgents, known as Boko Haram, have been responsible for numerous raids on Christian settlements, burning churches, killing Christians, raping and abducting women and girls.
In the southeast region of the country, a Christian couple works tirelessly to make a difference for women and girls.
Nigerian Pastor Efada Enuwa and her husband have taken in trafficked women and girls, as well as their babies, to offer them a new life.
Living in Otukpo, a town in Nigeria’s southeastern Benue State, Enuwa has a school for orphans and street children. Currently, there are 16 children under her care, with the help of eight staff members.
“They don’t pay tuition fees because they can’t afford it,” Enuwa told Pregnancy Help News via email.
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She has founded Restorer of Paths Care Foundation to help fund the effort, which she started in 2003.
Enuwa has empathy with the women and children under her care.
She wrote:
“I was a victim of teenage pregnancy at 15 and God saved me. I became born again and was called by God with the responsibility of rescuing other teenage mothers and street children. Since then, I have rescued over 20 teenage mothers and their babies.”
Currently, Enuwa is caring for two teenage mothers, Sara and Eunice, as well as 25 street children and orphans. The situation of children abandoned by their parents to the streets is a challenge to Nigeria’s government. In recent days, Muslim authorities in northern Kano State conducted a drag net and arrested more than 5,000 children who are seen as a “security threat.”
“I am married, and my husband is part of the ministry,” Enuwa said. ‘We live in the same home with the children, they are our children, because some of the parents of the teenage mothers or street children won't come for them.”
According to Enuwa, 14-year-old Sara was trafficked at the age of eight as a domestic slave. She was sexually assaulted and eventually became pregnant. Sara and her two-year-old baby boy Zion live with Enuwa. Zion is sick with sickle-cell anemia, but Sara continues to care for him and attends school.
Another case is teenage Eunice. Enuwa wrote that her parents sent her back to Nigeria from Liberia, where her guardian threw her out after she became pregnant. With the help of Restorer of Paths Care Foundation, Eunice and the baby were saved. Both now live at the shelter, where Eunice is in school.
Enuwa provided a testimony of her life and conversion:
“l became a mother at the age 15, when l was sexually assaulted. I tried abortion several times but couldn't get rid of the baby and I was left to suffer as a teenager. My father sent me away from home, but my mom stood by me. I went through so much, l was left at the mercy of men, but later I was encouraged by a total stranger who sent me back to school and l finished high school.
“I had another failed relationship, and when he insisted l abort the child l refused and l became a mother of two children but no father to care for them,” she said. “I had an encounter with Christ, and such a love, l knew God called me. I had a burden on my heart for young girls out of school and teenage mothers. That began my journey in the work l do now.”
Tweet This: "I had a burden on my heart for young girls out of school and teenage mothers. That began my journey in the work l do now” - Efada Enuwa.
Nigeria’s laws protecting unborn children are strong, relative to other countries. Abortion in Nigeria is governed according to geographical location.
In Southern Nigeria, the Criminal Code is enforced, while in Northern Nigeria, the Penal Code is enforced. The Criminal Code states that doctors providing an abortion is guilty of a felony and subject to as many as 14 years’ imprisonment, while a woman obtaining an abortion may be sentenced to up to 7 years. The Penal Code largely reflects the Criminal Code, with exceptions made for the purpose of saving the life of the mother.
More information about Restorer of Paths Care Foundation is available HERE.
