BOKO HARAM AND POPULATION DISPLACEMENT IN NIGERIA

A CASE FOR PSYCHOLOGICAL INPUT

Abstract

This paper explores the psychological implications of Boko Haram insurgency and population displacement nexus in the North – East. To achieve this objective, this paper adopted a descriptive design and thereby relied largely on textual information from primary and secondary sources. The secondary sources include journal articles and book chapters relevant to the subject. Displacement crises have led to increased insecurity, tensions and vulnerabilities in the affected communities. Some of the worst effects appear to be larger exposure to existing risks, such as severe food insecurity and sexual abuse. The challenges are particularly pronounced due to the concentration of forcefully displaced persons in small, confined geographical spaces—in a city, at a border, in a camp or along a narrow transit route. Such concentration leads to coping issues, for example, overcrowding and associated problems including inadequate physical protection and healthcare, increasing constraints on resources, and loss of livelihoods and educational opportunities. The paper concludes that displacement begins its psychological pains through forced loss of personal values and positive affects so as to survive. They begin to have a segmented identity, and hold on to their home, however dangerous it may be for them to stay, for as long as possible, because it gives them a sense of who they are. Finally, once their coping mechanism has been burnt out and their sense of sanity become crushed.