At first glance, Josiane*’s  story seems quite ordinary. It is just the account of a migrant sharing her experience of migrating and crossing other Maghreb borders. However, if you listen carefully, you will discover the sad story of a woman and her husband searching for a better tomorrow, driven not by charity, but by their skills and determination.

Josiane is originally from the Cote d’Ivoire. It was from there that she and her husband set out on their journey towards the Maghreb countries.

Josiane sits in a room arranged by humanitarian workers at a reception centre in Assamaka, small desert town in Agadez region, northwestern Niger, her face sad and her feet numb, bearing witness to the trauma of her long journey. In this silence, Dialogue Migration handed her the  microphone to tell her story and express her pain.

Josiane’s story began when she crossed the border between Algeria and Niger, heading towards Algiers. Accompanied by her husband, she says she prepared for the journey. “I prepared all the necessary papers for our trip,” she says, referring to the travel documents. Everything seemed to be going as planned for Josiane and her husband, but then things suddenly took a turn for the worse.

Beginning of an ordeal

When they arrived in Algeria, Josiane and her husband were mistaken for ‘bandits’ and had all their belongings confiscated. ‘The police took everything from us, even our shoes. They tore them off our feet and I had to walk barefoot for three days in the desert towards the Tunisian border,” says Josiane indignantly.

However, it was not just these acts that hit Josiane the hardest – it was the deeply invasive body search she was subjected to. ‘There were three policemen. Two of them grabbed her legs to spread them apart while the third carried out a body search, placing his hand directly on her genitals. They said they were looking for drugs,” she explains, tears welling in her eyes.

Algeria was only one stage of what Josiane and her husband endured on their journey to Morocco. With no possibility of turning back, they decided to continue towards Tunisia, where yet another traumatic surprise awaited them.

Upon entering Tunisia, Josiane and her husband had their travel documents and driving licences confiscated. “They took our travel documents and tore them up in front of us before we had even entered the country,” Josiane exclaims. The couple were then taken into the country, where they were separated and placed in a camp resembling a prison.

“People were called by phone to come and pick us up and take us to the camp. They make no distinction between women and men over there – they beat us day and night. I still have lingering injuries on my toes,’ she adds.

However, Josiane claims that there is no visa requirement between Côte d’Ivoire and Tunisia. So why did the Tunisian authorities subject them to such suffering?

Without travel documents, identification or money, Josiane and her husband somehow managed to enter Morocco. They spent four years there without being disturbed. On the return journey, however, Josiane had to endure the same atrocities before ending up in Assamaka in Niger.

Now seated at the Assamaka centre, Josiane recalls that migration routes to the Maghreb remain riddled with pitfalls, including arbitrary arrests, degrading searches and the destruction of documents. Her story sheds light on the grey area where security policies intersect with human suffering. Her story is not unique, it reflects the reality experienced by thousands of travellers from Côte d’Ivoire, Guinea and Niger who, lacking legal pathways, are at the mercy of unpredictable border controls. Morocco offered her a brief moment of stability, but this remains fragile as long as her documents are confiscated.