Floods Kills At Least 49 People And Displaced 41,344 in Nigeria
In this year’s flood outlook, the government said 31 of the country’s 36 states were at risk of experiencing “high flood”.
At least 49 people have died and thousands have been displaced in Nigeria following severe flooding in the northeast, according to the National Emergency Management Authority (NEMA).
Hard-hit states include Jigawa, Adamawa, and Taraba, with 41,344 people displaced, as reported by NEMA spokesperson Manzo Ezekiel.
In 2022, Nigeria faced its worst flooding in over a decade, resulting in more than 600 deaths, the displacement of about 1.4 million people, and the destruction of 440,000 hectares of farmland.
“We are just entering the peak of the season, particularly in the northern part of the country, and the situation is very dire,” Ezekiel told Reuters.
The floods have also ravaged approximately 693 hectares of agricultural land, exacerbating Nigeria’s ongoing battle with double-digit inflation driven by rising food prices.
Additionally, heavy rains have further hindered farming efforts, causing many farmers in the northeast to abandon their fields due to ongoing militant attacks.
“We also have information about the high tide in the upper countries of the River Niger before Nigeria. All of these are flowing towards Nigeria. We are beginning to see a manifestation of our predictions,” Ezekiel said.
The agency had warned in July of major floods in certain Local Government Areas of Rivers State.
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This information was shared in Port Harcourt during a workshop called ‘Downscaling of flood early warning strategies for early actions’. The director in charge of risk reduction at NEMA, Godwin Tepikor, had asked for support from the Local Government authorities to mitigate the effects of the flood.
The Zonal director of the Agency, Babatunde Adebiyi, stated that 13 local government areas have been identified, and the agency is working to prepare them for the coming flood.
Some of the high-risk LGAs identified include Ogba/Egbema/Ndoni, Degema, and Ahoada East and West, among others.
The agency also predicted that eight local government areas of Zamfara State would be affected by moderate flooding in the 2024 rainy season.
The agency’s Director-General in Zamfara, Zubaida Umar, disclosed that the eight LGAs include Bugundu, Gummi, Gusau, Bakura, Maradun, Talata Mafara, Shinkafi, and Zurmi.
In the 2024 Annual Flood Outlook, the Nigerian Hydrological Services Agency (NIHSA) predicted that 31 states with 148 local government areas are at high risk of flooding, while 35 states including the FCT with 249 LGAs are considered to be at moderate risk, and the remaining 377 LGAs are forecasted to have low flood risk.
