Maputo, 13 Feb (AIM) – Mozambique’s relief agency, the National Disaster Management Institute (INGD), on Sunday announced that six people have died in the storms and floods that battered Maputo city and province over the past week.
Two other people are known to be injured and three are missing. The INGD puts the total number of people affected at 36,700. The flood waters inundated about 7,300 homes, 15 schools and 15 health units. A large area of agricultural land was swamped, but the crop losses have not yet been calculated.
The INGD opened ten accommodation centres for people displaced from their homes by the floods. On Sunday, 13,700 people were taking shelter there.
Search and rescue operations in the flooded areas rescued about 15,300 people, some of whom had sought refuge on rooftops or in trees.
The INGD says it is providing food and medical assistance to the flood victims. It is providing the greatest attention to children, pregnant women, the elderly and the disabled.
The worst hit area is Boane district, on the Umbeluzi river. Viewed from the air on Sunday, the entire district seemed to have turned into an inland sea. Most roads in the district are impassable. In particular, the last ten kilometres of the main road from Maputo to Boane are under water. The INGD’s relief teams are using small boats to reach people cut off by the flood waters.
Prime Minister Adriano Maleiane visited the largest accommodation centre in Boane on Sunday, where he praised the prompt assistance provided to the victims by civil society organisations. About 700 people were accommodated in this centre.
Maleiane stressed that the accommodation centres are a temporary solution. “Everything must be done to ensure that this accommodation is provisional, because each of the displaced must return home. It is from their own homes that they can continue their lives”, he said.
He admitted that conditions in the accommodation centres are poor, and they are not able to care for people for a long time. “There is no government in the world that can programme for this kind of phenomenon”, said the Prime Minister.
He regarded assistance from the State as a last resort. “Natural disasters affect everyone”, said Maleiane. “Each person should organize himself as best he can, and the State appears when he is unable to take precautions”.
Nonetheless, he stressed that “the State is on the ground mobilising every effort to at least arrange transitional accommodation for those who are homeless. Later we shall have to mobilise efforts to rehabilitate the infrastructures that were damaged”.
The Pequenos Libombos dam on the Umbeluzi is no longer in danger of collapse, and the level of the reservoir behind the dam is now dropping. Much of the flood in Boane is because the dam had to open its floodgates. At one point the dam was discharging 2,800 cubic metres of water a second. There were fears that, if the level of the reservoir were to increase any further, the water would go over the top of the dam, threatening its physical integrity.
Visiting the dam on Saturday, the Minister of Public Works, Carlos Mesquita, noted that, over the previous 24 hours the level of the reservoir had dropped by a metre. “I was here early in the morning, and two or three hours later I came back, and I confirmed that the level of the water is continuing to fall”, said the Minister.
Mesquita also visited the bridge over the Kalachane river, in the neighbouring district of Namaacha. This bridge collapsed under the flood waters last week. Mesquita said a metallic bridge will be installed to allow vehicles to cross the river, while definitive repairs are being undertaken.
(AIM)
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