Floods are submerging whole houses in Nigeria. At least 80 have died trying to escape, dozens are missing, and another 1 million are displaced, displaced in name only. They are fleeing from the devastating floods that have killed over 1,700 people in the last two months.
At this point, Nigeria is experiencing a full blown disaster, one that has occurred in a number of countries, most notably in Egypt in the 1950s.
In fact, the last major flood to hit Nigeria was in 1959, when the government mobilized soldiers to flood the River Niger and prevent its banks from collapsing.
“It is hard to see how Nigeria can ever recover from this,” said Uduchi, a former governor and member of parliament. “We need help from all quarters: from donors, from the government, and from the private sector. For decades, we have been relying on external aid, and it has kept Nigeria afloat. But what I see now is a country in crisis. How is the government going to cope with this onslaught?”
A week of heavy rains have left a trail of destruction and a legacy of misery for the city of Kano. There are reports of entire villages being inundated by the floods. They have caused mass displacement of residents, and of the city itself from the center of Kano where the population has shrunk to 30 percent of its previous level.
Since January, three major floods have occurred in Kano. These were two floods that caused mass flooding in Kano and nearby areas in May. The recent floods are the third in as many weeks.
The area hit by these floods has been declared disaster areas after three major floods within the span of a week.
There is no word on who caused the floods. Many Nigerians speculate that it was the construction of massive dams on the river. The question however is that if the dams were built before the floods, is anyone there to blame for the destruction
