Scarlet Cord Brings Hope to Southern Kaduna Widows, Blends Trauma Healing with Enterprise for Lasting Peace
By: Labaran Ahmed
A non-profit organisation committed to rebuilding lives shattered by insecurity, Scarlet Cord Initiative for Women and Youth, has expanded its grassroots intervention to Gumel in Kachia Local Government Area of southern Kaduna, where it delivered a two-day holistic empowerment programme to about 100 widows traumatised by banditry, kidnapping and insurgency.
Held in Gora community, the programme marked a decisive shift from short-term relief to sustainable empowerment, combining trauma psycho-support, mentorship, skills development, financial literacy and enterprise advocacy. Widows drawn from Awon, Ungwan Bawa, Gadanaji and Gora—communities repeatedly hit by violent attacks—were deliberately taken through healing before business training, ensuring that economic skills would take root on restored emotional ground.
The opening session set the tone. Through a symbolic “Yarn Coil” exercise, participants passed a ball of yarn from hand to hand, forming a visible web of connection. It was not a craft lesson, organisers explained, but a statement of intent: grief would be woven into resilience, and resilience into enterprise. From that moment, the widows began a shared journey of transformation—learning to translate loss into leadership and survival into strategy.
Speaking at the event, Patron of the Initiative, Sunday Agang, underscored the centrality of trauma healing to recovery. “Trauma freezes the future and makes hope a fearful place,” he said, urging participants to engage fully with every session. “Healing is not optional; it is the doorway to rebuilding.”
The training moved swiftly from theory to practice under the guidance of Lead Facilitator Anzaku Auta and Facilitator Simi Francis. Sessions on Personal Entrepreneurial Characteristics (PECs) and the “Chair Model” reframed each participant as the chief executive of her own life. Business idea generation, problem-solving and prototype design followed, culminating in practical plans tailored to community needs.
Facilitator Mercy Anku, who led the programme’s interactive Q&A and feedback segment, captured the philosophy behind the approach: “You cannot teach a woman to calculate profit if she is still calculating loss. We healed the heart first to steady the hand that would sketch a business.”
The impact was immediate and personal. Hadiza Bello from Awon, who lost her farmer husband in a violent attack, unveiled a detailed prototype for a poultry feed production unit. “They killed my husband, but they did not kill my mind,” she said. “This plan is my promise to feed my children through my own work, not pity.”
Aisha Ibrahim from Gora designed a packaged groundnut cake venture aimed at supplying local schools. “I always had the skill,” she noted. “This training gave me a new lens—and a future.”
According to Simi Francis, the women’s ideas—ranging from seedling nurseries to mobile water solutions—directly address gaps created by conflict. “Their vulnerability has sharpened their insight. We provided structure; they supplied the solutions,” she said.
In her address, Executive Director Esther Moses Badung described the initiative as a strategic investment in peacebuilding. “Aid alone is a sedative; empowerment is the cure,” she stated. “An economically empowered widow educates her children, creates jobs and becomes an architect of peace. Our integrated model—healing first, enterprise next—is the blueprint for sustainable recovery.”
The programme also featured sessions on marketing and effective communication, facilitated by Teyei Moses, and concluded with the distribution of training materials and a commitment to follow-up mentorship. While the challenge of start-up capital remains, organisers announced plans for advocacy and partnerships to bridge the gap.
Participants used the platform to draw attention to the limited reach of humanitarian interventions in their communities. Responding, the Scarlet Cord leadership reaffirmed its openness to collaboration, calling on trauma-healing organisations, faith-based bodies and empowerment partners to extend tangible support to underserved areas of southern Kaduna.
The testimonies were sobering. Godiya Samaila recounted losing her husband and son in the same wave of violence, leaving two generations of widows in one household. Martina Bulus narrated how her husband’s murder was followed days later by the death of the son whose school fees he had just secured. A 23-year-old widow with three children appealed for educational sponsorships to return to school and train as a nurse—“not just for me,” she said, “but for every young widow still daring to dream.”
By blending psychosocial healing with enterprise development, observers say the Scarlet Cord Initiative has demonstrated a practical, people-centred pathway to recovery—one that rebuilds dignity, restores agency and strengthens community resilience in the face of Nigeria’s security challenges.
