By Laleye Dipo
The prediction of flash floods in 26 states of the federation this year has begun to manifest as two local government areas in Niger state have been ravaged by flood in the last three days.
The flood has also led to the death of four people, mostly children, with hundreds displaced from their communities.
The local government areas affected are Gurara where not less than 15 communities were sacked by flood and a bridge linking one of the towns to other parts of the state washed off, and Lapai LGA which is the worse hit with the four dead children and 23 communities displaced.
The flood incidents followed three days of persistent torrential rainfall causing both the rivers Kaduna and Niger to overflow their banks.
Special Adviser to Governor Abubakar Sani Bello on Niger East Matters, Mr Pius Wakili, who confirmed the Gurara Local government area incident, said schools, residential houses, churches and mosques and several hectares of farmlands were either partially or totally destroyed as a result of the flood.
Not less than 3000 people, he said, had been displaced as a result of the incident.
Governor Abubakar Sani Bello, who visited the affected villages in Lapai local government area on Monday, described the incident as ‘disastrous’ and called on the Federal government to come to the assistance of the state in tackling the problem because the financial requirement to tackle the problem ‘is not only enormous but beyond the capability of the state’.
“However as a government, we sympathized with the communities and we will give our support despite our lean resources to reduce the hardship of our people’ he said adding that the State Emergency Management Agency would be mobilized to come to the assistance of the people.
