Managing flood disasters in Nigeria

An editorial in AllAfrica.com, via the Daily Trust (Nigeria): Weather experts agree that this year's rainfall has been particularly heavy in several parts of the country. This is good for agriculture, and some farmers would thank their good fortune this season. On the other hand, the rains have been so heavy that they have brought destruction and deaths to some communities.

Last week, reports from several states and Abuja documented the havoc that the rains wrought in towns and villages. Urban areas were not spared. Communities in the Federal Capital Territory, Lagos, Kaduna, Gombe, Niger, Benue, Nasarawa, Zamfara and Jigawa states were affected by the heavy downpour. Houses and farmlands were submerged or washed away, trees uprooted and properties destroyed.

….In hindsight, some of the destruction could have been avoided or its effects mitigated if proper environmental rules had been observed and the authorities had not been lax in enforcing building codes. In some parts of the country, flooding has become something of a seasonal occurrence during the rainy season. As such, communities often prepare for the impacts of such floods, and take precautionary measures. But this year's rains appeared to have caught people off guard, hence the widespread devastation that has resulted.

Usually, areas prone to such flooding are blocked drainages and waterways, and absence of proper drainage system….

Downtown Lagos, shot by Ulf Ryttgens, Wikimedia Commons via World66, under Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 1.0 License