ABUJA, Nigeria (AP) — Weeks of flooding in Nigeria has killed nearly 200 people and washed away homes and farmland, the country’s disaster agency said, further threatening food supplies, especially in the hard-hit northern region.
The floods, blamed on poor infrastructure and poorly maintained dams, have killed 185 people and displaced 208,000 people in 28 of Nigeria’s 36 states, the National Emergency Management Agency said in an update on Friday, prompting frantic efforts to evacuate hundreds of thousands of people to makeshift shelters.
Nigeria records floods every year, mainly due to non-compliance with environmental guidelines and inadequate infrastructure. The worst floods the country has experienced in a decade were in 2022 killing more than 600 people and displacing more than 1 million.
But unlike 2022, when the floods were just beginning, the blame is given to heavier rainfallThe Nigerian Meteorological Agency has predicted that most parts of the country will experience delayed or normal rainfall this year. The agency said the current flooding is mainly the result of human activities.
“What we are doing is causing climate change, so there is a shift from normal,” said Ibrahim Wasiu Adeniyi, head of the central forecasting unit. “We have some who are randomly dumping garbage, some who are building houses without permission along the waterways,” he added.
Nigeria’s disaster management agency has warned that flooding could worsen in the coming weeks as floodwaters rush into central and southern states.
“People (in flood-prone areas) need to evacuate now … because we are running out of time,” spokesman Manzo Ezekiel said.
In Jigawa, the worst-hit state, where 37 people have died, the impact of the floods has been “devastating” and authorities are converting public buildings and schools into shelters for the displaced, said Nura Abdullahi, the state’s emergency services chief.
The floods have so far destroyed 107,000 hectares of farmland, mainly in the northern states, which are among the worst hit and home to most of Nigeria’s crops.
Many farmers in the region are already unable to farm as much as they would like because inputs are declining and families are struggling in Nigeria. economic hardship or as a result of violent attacks that have caused them to flee.
As a result, Nigeria has the highest number of hungry people in the world, with 32 million people — 10% of the global burden — facing acute hunger in the country, according to the UN food agency.
Abdullahi Gummi resident in Gummi council area of Zamfara state said the floods destroyed his family’s farmlands, which are also their source of income. “We spent about 300,000 naira ($188) on plants but everything is gone,” Gummi said.
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Mohammed Ibrahim in Kaduna, Nigeria, contributed.
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