From Yakubu Mustapha Minna
Niger State Government has asked residents of over 2,000 riverine communities to relocate to safer grounds following fresh flood warnings issued by the Federal Government and the Nigerian Meteorological Agency.
The Governor’s Special Adviser on Media Strategy and Communication, Mr Jonathan Vatsa, in a statement issued in Minna, urged the residents to take the warnings seriously in order to avoid a repeat of the recent Mokwa flood tragedy.
Vatsa further said there was an urgent need for residents living along river banks to move to higher ground to avoid a major disaster.
According to him, the state government would not want a recurrence of the Mokwa flood, which claimed over 200 lives and destroyed property worth millions of naira.
He revealed that over 2,000 communities across 15 local government areas of the state are living by the riverside.
He said the communities need to heed to the federal government flood warning.
The Special Adviser noted that the state government will soon embark on a statewide awareness and sensitisation of the people, especially those communities that are prone to flood on the need for them to detach themselves from their ancestral homes as the rain approaches.
