Communal Crisis and Psychological Trauma of Victims of Ezza/Ezillo Communal War in Ebonyi State, Nigeria

Abstract

Communal crisis dislocates sources of livelihood while the psychological consequences has been
debilitating. Psychological distress experienced during communal conflict dislocates a persons’
integral psychological wellbeing leading to psychological trauma. This study is a narrative
inquiry of the experiences of psychological trauma underwent by victims of Ezza/Ezillo
communal crisis in Ebonyi State. The principal objective was to investigate if there are elements
of psychological trauma in the experiences of the participants. The study adopted the qualitative
narrative approach because narrative inquiries have the strength to expose silenced voices like
those of war victims. The narrators comprised of 20 communal war victims who experienced the
Ezza/Ezillo communal crisis who were sampled through purposive and convenience sampling
technique. The study was anchored on John Bowlby’s and Mary Ainsworth attachment theory.
Narrative content analysis was conducted and results revealed that participants made sense of
their experience of the crisis using knowledge that resembled those of psychological trauma.
Such experiences included but not limited to a loss of sense of self, nightmares and flashback
memories, feeling of disconnection from the world, sleepless nights, feeling disoriented,
disorganized and confused, having problem of concentration, feeling of helplessness and
suppressed emotions. Narrative analysis in the study further revealed that the experiences
affected their overall wellbeing and made them at some point to have suicide ideation.
Conclusion was made that the communal war the participants experienced affected their overall
psychological wellbeing such that they made sense of their experience of war with knowledge
that coincided with those of psychological trauma. Recommendations were made some of which
included that the victims of the Ezza/Ezillo communal war required both psychological and
financial intervention to help ameliorate their sufferings. Such intervention was expected from
Federal government, State government, Non-governmental organizations and other Agencies.