Thousands in Africa wait for aid amid catastrophic floods
by Vincent Mayanja
Hundreds of thousands of people awaited desperately needed relief supplies and faced the threat of epidemics on Friday as the death toll climbed in Africa's worst floods in three decades.
At least 300 have died in the flooding since heavy rains began sweeping across the continent two months ago, according to figures based on reports by hospital, government and humanitarian sources and compiled by AFP.
With nearly half of Africa's countries hit, the cost of the damage, expected to be huge, was only beginning to emerge.
In Rwanda, where at least 15 people died earlier this month in flash floods, two cholera cases were reported on Thursday in flood-hit districts, said Innocent Nyaruhirira, minister in charge of epidemics.
Cholera outbreaks have already caused 68 deaths in conflict-wracked Sudan, the country worst hit by the flooding.
The United Nations said up to 625,000 people could be in need of emergency aid in Sudan, Africa's largest country.
Neighbouring Uganda has also been heavily affected by the floods, with at least 400,000 people in need of assistance in eastern regions.
The European Union has decided to donate some two million euros (2.8 million dollars) to Togo, Ghana and Burkina Faso, EU officials said in the Togolese capital, Lome.
Besides paying for supplies, the money is also to be used to help prevent the spread of malaria.
But despite international mobilisation and donations, flooding of some crucial routes was paralysing the delivery of aid.
Ugandan Minister of State for Refugees and Disaster Preparedness Musa Ecweru said the floods had affected cross-border road traffic into southern Sudan.
Hundreds of trucks delivering supplies to southern Sudan had been advised to use a longer route through Kampala.
"The road network has been paralysed. The situation is traumatic," he said.
The UN's Children Fund said in a statement Thursday that "floods sweeping across northern and eastern Uganda have damaged hundreds of schools, leaving at least 100,000 children out of class."
The NGO ActionAid criticised the relief effort in Uganda, where close to 20 people have died since the floods began and a massive food shortage looms.
"There is still very slow response on the ground especially from government, though a lot has been promised since the floods in northern and eastern Uganda have now been declared a national disaster," it said in a statement.
The organisation warned that the crisis had caused the prices of fuel and basic food supplies to soar, preventing thousands from feeding their families.
West Africa was also badly hit, and Nigeria's Red Cross announced Thursday that the total death toll was 64.
It added that 22,000 people have been displaced in 10 northern states in Nigeria, Africa's most populous nation, as well as in the Lagos area, the huge economic capital in the southwest of the country.
The minister of social action and national solidarity in landlocked Burkina Faso, one of west Africa's poorest nations, said 33 people had been killed and nearly 7,500 homes had been destroyed.
Countries as far north as Algeria were also affected, amid warnings by governments and aid agencies that further rains would have catastrophic humanitarian and economic consequences.
In Algeria, officials on Thursday said the cost of damage caused on last Friday and Saturday alone was estimated at 21 million euros (30 million dollars).
The inaccessibility of many areas has made it difficult to assess the death toll.
World Food Programme
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Copyright © 2007 Agence France Presse.