As many as 75 people have died and 6,529 have been displaced by raging floods and fierce windstorms in the Gashua Local Government Area of Yobe State in the past six months.

This was according to Mohammed Goje, the executive secretary of Yobe State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA), who was addressing reporters at a press briefing about last weekend’s disaster floods.

More than 200 people had sustained varying degrees of injuries, he said.

More than 200 people had been injured, he said.

Thousands of people in Gashua had to flee from their homes as water gushed into them, collapsing some and submerging others.

Abba Ibrahim, a resident, told RNI reporter Aisha Jamal that the flooding began on Friday, September 30, and lasted the whole weekend.

He said no one knew what caused the flood because there had not been any rain.

“We think a dam was opened and suddenly the water just flooded in. It was really high. It caused a lot of loss for people because, apart from houses, many businesses were also destroyed in the flood.

“Thousands of people were affected by the flood. Places like Abujan Amare, Anguwan Sarki, Kasuwan Gwari and Kate Road were all submerged in water.”

Ibrahim said communities were forced to abandon their flooded homes and many were displaced. “Men, women and children were displaced. I saw some fathers carrying their little kids on their shoulders as they waded through the gushing water. Many people do not have a place to stay. We can’t find food and the flooding has ruined the crops.

“Some residents took shelter in public schools but eventually the schools got flooded too and people have no other place to go. Some are wandering around town, others who have relatives have gone to stay with them and many just don’t have anywhere to lay their heads. Their houses have collapsed, no one has been eating, there are children all over the place. Some residents have helped displaced people with food and have given them sacks to block the waterways. But it is not enough, most of the victims need shelter and relief materials.

“The government and non-governmental organisations [NGOs] should be helping us because this is an emergency; houses have collapsed and thousands have no place to sleep. Food is also an issue. The victims have nothing to eat. We are scared because we don’t know when the flood might come again.

“The government and NGOs should take measures to block the water for our safety and then help people go back to their homes and try to continue to live normally.”

RNI reporter Alhaji Sheriff Bura reported that Garin Kanuri, Gilmasuri, Damsa, Kabajo, Kurmari, Kurnawa, among others, were the communities around Gashua that had also been hit by the flood.

He said: “SEMA has advised other communities, including Krikisamma, which are prone to flooding to evacuate their communities because their houses are in the path of the flood.”

Goje told journalists at the press briefing that 75 people had died because of the ravaging floods and violent windstorms across 255 communities in the past six months.

He said 17 local government areas had been affected and that the flood had washed away 10 major roads and had displaced 6,592 persons in some of the worst-hit areas of Bade, Karasuwa, Jakusko, Gujba, and Gulani.

Goje was addressing reporters in Damaturu. He said the floods and major windstorms had caused damage in 17 local government areas of the state.

“Those in flood-prone areas and along waterways have been the hardest hit.”

He told journalists that SEMA, with other frontline ministries and agencies and local volunteers were working round the clock to help the affected communities as directed by the state governor, Mai Mala Buni.

AISHA SD JAMAL