Okwe Obi, Abuja
The Nigerian Hydrological Services Agency (NIHSA) has raised the alarm that the country would experience severe flooding if urgent measures were not taken to mitigate the disaster.
Director General of the agency, Clement Eze, who addressed journalists, yesterday, in Abuja, said the 36 states including the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) would witness different levels of flooding in 2019.
But he urged residents of Niger, Lagos, Benue, Imo, Edo, Abia, Jigawa, Adamawa, Delta and Cross River States respectively to brace up for the disaster ahead.
Nze included Enugu, Kebbi, Nasarawa, Bauchi and the Federal Capital Territory among flood-prone states.
He said out of the 774 local government areas of the country, 74 were predicted to be highly probable while 279 local government areas are probable areas of flood and 421 were predicted to be less probable.
“Daily records from the agency’s hydrological measuring stations across the country show steady rise in water levels. Particularly, the hydrological measuring station downstream the confluence in Kogi State show the likelihood of spread of damage that may arise from flooding incidents in 2019.
“This started manifesting very early as seen in no less than 15 states, namely: Niger, Lagos, Edo, Imo, Abia, Jigawa, Adamawa, Delta, Rivers, Cross River, Oyo, Enugu, Kebbi, Nasarawa, Bauchi and the Federal Capital Territory.
“There is high probability that more states would still be affected by both river flooding and urban flooding as flood from the upper reaches the Niger Basin (Guinea, Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Cote d’Ivoire, Chad and Cameron).”
However, Eze, encouraged states with high level of water to clean up drainages, remove illegal structures blocking free flow of water to simmer down the severity.
“The localised urban flooding incidents being witnessed in some cities and communities are expected to continue due to high rainfall intensity of long duration, rainstorm, blockage of drainage system and poor urban planning resulting in erection of structures within the floodplains and waterways.
“River and coastal flooding are expected to come into place as the nation approaches the peak of raining season. Therefore, states and local governments should endeavour to remove structures built within floodplains, clear blocked drainages,culvert and other waterways.
“The localised urban flooding incidents being witnessed in some cities and communities in the country are expected to continue.
“The flooding incidents are due to high rainfall intensity of long duration, rainstorms, blockage of drainage system and poor urban planning resulting in erection of structures within the floodplains and waterways.
“River flooding as well as coastal flooding is expected to come into place as the nation approaches the peak of raining season.
“Therefore, states and local governments should endeavour to remove structures built within the floodplains, clear blocked drainage, culverts and other waterways,’’ he said.