At Least 300 Die, 100,000 Displaced By Flood In 2022 – NEMA

A few days into the last quarter of 2022, the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) confirmed that no fewer than 300 citizens died and 500 were injured by floods across the country this year alone.

The government agency revealed also that over 100,000 people were displaced by the events in 2022.

Naija News understands that NEMA Director-General, Mustapha Ahmed, made the disclosure yesterday in Abuja at an emergency technical meeting on the flood situation in Nigeria.

Lamenting the situation, Ahmed said the flood disaster mostly affected 29 states, including the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).

He noted that the meeting was meant to urgently review emergency situations and outline promising solutions as a call to action by all emergency responders.

“Our record indicates that more than 300 lives have been lost, 500 persons are seriously injured with more than 100,000 others displaced and living either in temporary shelters including schools, other public buildings among benevolent host families,” he said.

While assuring that NEMA would continue to work with the Nigeria Hydrological Services Agency (NIHSA) and the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NiMet) to downscale impact-based weather forecasts to the public, Ahmed noted that all zonal, territorial and operation offices of the agency had been activated to coordinate resources in their areas of responsibilities to respond to any flood situation.

Ahmed urged the government to give its maximum support, noting that NEMA had prepositioned food and non-food relief items and started deploying them to affected states.

He said: “I call on all relevant frontline responders to intensify their preparedness efforts, carry out early warning targeting the most vulnerable communities, prepare for evacuation to safer ground and provide all other forms of life-saving assistance to persons at risk.”

On his part, the Director-General, of Nigeria Hydrological Services Agency (NIHSA), Clement Nze commended NEMA for bringing all stakeholders to brainstorm on how to save the lives and property of Nigerians.

He said that his agency had been following the trend and it was a bit disturbing that the progression of flooding, destruction, and loss of lives and property, had been quite humongous.

He, however, called on state governments to take precautionary measures to avoid the impacts of flooding in their states.