National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) has identified poorly-managed urbanization, ecosystem degradation and poverty as major causes of flooding in the country.
The agency’s head of operations (Ekiti, Ondo and Osun), Mr Kadiri Olanrewaju who stated this said the factors were the main drivers of vulnerability that threatened human lives.
Olanrewaju who alerted the people on the danger of flooding urged residents of Ekiti State to take precautionary measures against flooding in their areas.
Ekiti State, according to the NEMA boss, had been marked among the states to experience flooding this year based on the weather forecast which revealed that most local government areas in the state were flood-prone with high risks due to seasonal rainfall.
He spoke in Ado Ekiti during a critical stakeholders meeting on disaster risk management tagged, ‘Duties, functions and responsibilities in disaster management’, organised by the agency to improve community awareness and enhance stakeholder response.
Olanrewaju said, “Everyone of us has witnessed the recent floods in Nigeria, which claimed lives, displaced thousands of people as well as destroyed properties worth millions of naira. Floods cause widespread ecological dislocation.
“it has become necessary for communities, individuals and authorities to take proactive measures. We need to believe that prevention is better and cheaper than cure, as well as consider climate change issues more seriously,”
The general manager, Ekiti State Emergency Management Agency, Mr Jide Borode, described NEMA as an important collaborating partner in the effective management of disaster issues.
Borode added that such had facilitated the effectiveness of people’s response in risky communities and internally displaced persons to adapt and live with the risk factors that come with flooding.
