Hon. Henry Nwawuba, a member of the Federal House of Representatives representing Mbaitoli/Ikeduru Federal Constituency of Imo State, has solicited for Federal Government’s intervention for 35,000 victims who have been displaced by floods in 35 communities.
Nwawuba, while speaking on the ravaging flood in Mbaitoli/Ikeduru Federal Constituency, urged the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to provide a moratorium for farmers who obtained loan facilities and were affected by the ravaging flood.
While acknowledging that the challenges posed by this year’s flood were unprecedented, he observed that “this year we have witnessed high volumes in terms of rainfall from the north down to the southern part of Nigeria. My constituency is not different.
“We have been affected tremendously by displacements. Of course, our farmlands washed away. And people are generally being displaced. We naturally in the southeast are bedevilled with a lot of erosion issues, maybe because of the texture of our soil, but this year it has been particularly bad.
“Thank God it is budget season and it would be good to see us capture palliatives and things that would cushion the effects against next year’s harvest because we know that food production in the country this year would be a challenge.
“I have reached out to the intervention agencies, especially NEMA. In my letter, I listed about 35 communities because we have 64 autonomous communities that make up my constituency. We have a total of about 35,000 people that are currently displaced. Homes have been washed out.
“Yesterday in the news if you saw what happened in Bayelsa where we even had dead bodies being washed off the ravaging flood. Flooding is a very big menace and looking for food and relief items and even non-food items at the moment, just to cushion the effects. It has been very bad.
“I hope it can be taken as a matter of emergency, so we can get necessary relief to the people as quickly as possible. Hopefully, I do believe the emergency services would get to us. We have also reached out to the refugee commission for displaced people.
“We are just looking out for any kind of intervention or assistance be it emergency or scheduled. Whatever we can get now for the Federal Government would really go a long way in assisting the people,” Hon. Nwawuba urged.
