Floods leave death, despair in Northern Bahr el Ghazal

AWEIL – Flooding caused by heavy rains has claimed the lives of three people, including a mother and an infant, in Nyin-aluk residential area, in Northern Bahr el Ghazal state. Hundreds of families have been displaced by the deadly floods, which have destroyed about 2,300 homes and farms, as well as vital infrastructure such as schools.

Heavy downpours have cut off roads in areas such as Dokul and Akuem-Kou, forcing Governor Simon Ober to lead a risk management team to assess the situation and damages on Tuesday.

“We have come to inspect and see the progress that has been made so far – the company is doing well, and we encourage them to continue upgrading this road,” Ober said.

“We are now in Dokul, one of the road sections that is badly affected and the only one that connects state headquarters with the county of Aweil East and also Aweil North,” he added.

The state governor said they had just concluded a third meeting with the State Risk Management Council and agreed on regular road maintenance and modalities of food distribution to flood victims.

In addition, the chairperson for the Relief and Rehabilitation Commission, Parson Lual Awech, said food distribution to flood victims had begun on Thursday as part of a government initiative to address the situation.

“We have distributed 1,500 bags; at least 500 bags of rice and 1,000 bags of sorghum,” Awech said. “There are shelters that we are going to distribute shortly. In Aweil East, the ICRC organization is going to distribute 2,000 shelters to flood-affected individuals in Aweil East, Aweil town, and other parts.”

Although the Northern Bahr el Ghazal government has earmarked SSP 200 million to procure food for flood victims, it is a drop in the ocean.

Now, the State RRC boss is calling on humanitarian agencies to intervene in rescuing flood victims. “We are expecting humanitarian agencies to support in terms of shelters and other non-food items to flood-affected populations,” he said.

Similarly, the ARC company has already embarked on rehabilitating the roads that were cut off by floods.

South Sudan ranks seventh in the world for people’s vulnerability to river floods. Between 2019 and 2022, torrential rains and rising water levels around Lake Victoria, one of Africa’s Great Lakes, generated a wide swampy area of flooding in the country.

Frequent floods in recent years have destroyed health facilities, water and food sources, and shelters. This year, more than 5.4 million people are expected to live in flood-affected areas.

Recent forecasts indicate an increased likelihood of above-normal rainfall between July and October and large volumes of water being released from Lake Victoria and Jinja dam into the Nile River system.

Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) said earlier, “Devastating floods are expected to hit South Sudan over the next three months, threatening to worsen food insecurity and further limit access to safe water and proper sanitation facilities for people who are already among the world’s most vulnerable to the impacts.”