Church Groups Seek Aid for Flood Victims

Catholic charities and other humanitarian agencies say over 1.5 million people in sub-Saharan Africa have been hit by raging floods and are in urgent need of help.

The network of Catholic charities, Caritas Internationalis, said countries affected range from Mauritania in the west to Kenya in the east, including Burkina Faso, Togo, Ghana, Ethiopia, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda.

Caritas has launched emergency appeals to respond to the needs of the people in Uganda and Ghana. In Uganda, where the government has declared a state of emergency, flooding has affected 300,000 people. And with no let up in the heavy rains, that figure is expected to rise.

Caritas Uganda's communications officer Vincent Sebukyu said, "The situation is terrible. People have been forced from their homes on to higher ground. Now, even that has been washed away. Many of the areas are completely cut off from outside help. People can no longer move."

At the same time, United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) teams are fanning out across sub-Saharan Africa bringing in helicopters and boats where necessary to help the flood victims.

"Funds, especially cash, are urgently needed," WFP said after appealing for nearly USD 65 million to feed flood victims as well as refugees and other displaced people in Uganda for the next six months.

West Africa is experiencing some of its worst floods in 10 years, affecting 500,000 people in 18 countries, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

In Togo, 60,000 people are in urgent need of food assistance, according to preliminary assessments, but the figures could be higher as information from inaccessible areas is being collected. Heavy rainfalls in the north have washed away a significant portion of cultivated land and destroyed over 30,000 houses as well as six dams.

In Ghana, it is estimated that 75,000 people are in urgent need of aid including food, clothing, blankets, cooking utensils, canoes or boats, mosquito nets and water purification tablets.

In Mauritania, floodwaters covered most of the city of Tintane in August, destroying public and private infrastructure. There are also thousands of flood victims in Mali and Niger.

In Sudan, 500,000 people have been directly affected by floods, at least 200,000 are homeless and 113 people have died. Since July, torrential rains have caused flash floods in the east and south.

Across Ethiopia, food aid has started for more than 60,000 flood victims amid some overcrowding in temporary shelters and threats of an outbreak of water-borne diseases. Floods in the north, west and south have affected some 183,000 people.

In Rwanda, torrential rains in the northwest have killed 15, damaged homes in at least 10 villages and left 7,000 people homeless, while in Kenya, lowland floods in the west have reportedly displaced 1,700 families. In the arid and semi-arid lands, heavy rains have cut road access in the Samburu region in the northeast.