The National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) has described Tuesday’s flash flood in Maiduguri, Borno State, as an unprecedented event.
Floodwaters from an overflowing dam have devastated thousands of homes in the northeastern Nigerian city, with emergency officials expressing concerns that the situation may deteriorate further.
“It is an unprecedented incident,” NEMA spokesman Ezekiel Manzo told AFP on Tuesday. “Some of the central parts of the city that have not witnessed flood in so many years are witnessing it today.”
Thousands of homes have been submerged by the rapid rise of waters after the rupture of the Alau dam on the Ngadda River, 20 kilometres (12 miles) south of Maiduguri.
“The last three days have over 150,000 individuals with over 23,000 households affected,” said NEMA zonal coordinator Surajo Garba.
But with more locations being hit, “we are sure the figure will be much over 200,000 individuals,” Garba forecast.
“The flood, which began over the weekend and worsened in the following days, was the direct result of excess water from the Alau Dam,” said Nigeria’s Vice-President Kashim Shettima, who hails from Maiduguri as he visited the area.
“The collapse of the spillways unleashed a significant surge of water downstream, causing widespread flooding in the surrounding communities,” added Shettima.
The flood also inundated the city’s post office and main zoo, with authorities warning that “deadly animals has been washed away into our communities (sic).”
Social media showed pictures of an ostrich which had supposedly escaped from the facility wandering the streets of the city.
“Disaster”
Manzo stated that the forecasts did not anticipate the scale of the flooding, attributing the severity of the “disaster” to the effects of climate change.
He informed AFP that there have been fatalities due to the incident but did not provide a specific number, as rescue operations are still ongoing in the affected areas.
With flooding remaining “high in many parts of the city,” authorities have established three “temporary shelters” for the victims.
“Homes are submerged, schools shut down and businesses crippled as people evacuate with their belongings,” the UN High Commissioner for Refugees’ Nigeria office said.
Floods have killed at least 229 people and displaced around 380,000 more in parts of the country, according to NEMA, but mainly in the northern region.
The NEMA spokesman told AFP at the end of last month that the central and southern parts of Nigeria may be hit harder as rain intensifies.
Some 110,000 hectares (280,000 acres) of farmland have also been affected, NEMA figures showed.
Damages to farmland will worsen Nigeria’s high rates of food insecurity, Save the Children warned last week.
“One in every six children across Nigeria faced hunger in June-August this year” –- a 25 percent increase on the same period last year, the NGO said in a statement.
Flooding, often resulting from heavy rains and inadequate infrastructure, has caused significant damage in Africa’s most populous country in the past.
In 2012, over 360 people died and more than 2.1 million were displaced due to severe flooding. Similarly, in 2022, the worst floods in a decade resulted in over 500 deaths and displaced 1.4 million people.
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu extended his “condolences” to those affected, particularly to families who have lost their livelihoods due to the disaster.
His office also stated that he is collaborating with state authorities to address the immediate humanitarian needs of the affected population.