Monday, October 28, 2024
N’Djamena, Chad
Six West and Central African countries hardest hit by the “unprecedented” floods affecting the continent will benefit from 5.4 million euros in humanitarian aid from Brussels, the website of the European representation in Chad announced on Wednesday September 25.
“The European Union has released 5,400,000 euros in humanitarian aid to help the most severely affected populations in the wake of the devastating floods in Chad, Niger, Nigeria, Cameroon, Mali and Burkina Faso,” says a press release.
Since the start of the rainy season, torrential downpours – “a stark reminder of the growing impact of climate change” – have ravaged several regions, killing more than 1,500 people, affecting 4 million and displacing more than 1.2 million in Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Chad, Guinea, Mali, Nigeria and Niger, according to a report by the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
Calling on the international community to mobilize, the IOM has already released $3 million (EUR 2.7 million) in emergency aid to Nigeria, where some 650,000 people have fled the floods.
Faced with the torrential rains affecting the African continent “much more severely than in previous episodes”, the Europeans have allocated 1.35 million euros to Niger, 1.1 million euros to Nigeria, 1 million euros to Chad and Mali, 650,000 euros to Cameroon and 350,000 euros to Burkina Faso. This envelope is in addition to the “232 million euros in humanitarian aid already allocated to these countries since the beginning of the year”, according to the EU press release.
According to the latest figures from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (Ocha), 503 people have died and more than 1.7 million have been affected by the bad weather in Chad.
In Niger, where the start of the school year has been postponed, more than a million people have been affected, according to the latest figures.
According to the IOM, the exceptional rainfall recorded in Mali is the worst since 1967, with more than 180,000 people affected.
In Cameroon, flooding has killed 20 people and affected more than 236,000 since the end of August in the far north of the country, according to the latest Ocha figures.
In West and Central Africa, flooding is “exacerbating health risks”, promoting water-borne diseases such as cholera, while damage to infrastructure such as roads is complicating access to affected areas, stresses the IOM.
Last week, the World Food Program (WFP), which provides food assistance to 2 million people in the worst-hit areas, described the situation as “worrying”, with thousands of hectares of arable land and herds washed away.
Humaniterre with AFP
