Bayelsa: Flood victims groan, appeal for assistance

Residents along the Epie creek in Yenagoa on Wednesday bemoaned the impact of the flooding caused by the overflow of water from Taylor creek, tributaries of the Orashi and Niger rivers.

The residents of the riverside settlements moaned that the water levels at the creek had risen above tolerable limits on Tuesday.

Joy Elvis, a resident of the Onopa neighbourhood of Yeagoa, said that the residents were helpless in efforts to deal with the flooding, as the assistance, which the state government pledged in its sensitisation messages, were not in sight.

“It has not been easy, the water levels have been on the increase and this is usually expected at this time of the year but on Tuesday, floodwater entered our houses and we have since been under intense pressure.

“We need assistance urgently but no one seems to care; we have resorted to moving some of our valuable things to neighbours’ houses because the government did not provide alternative shelter for us.

“Our prayer is that the water goes back soon because if it goes beyond this level, even the houses of the good Samaritans who are currently accommodating us will be threatened as well,” Elvis said.

Another resident, John Abide, told NAN that the people had been compelled to use canoes to access their homes, following the increasing water levels in the past few days.

“A lot of the affected people are not willing to leave their homes because they don’t want to be a burden to others; so what most people do is to adapt by constructing wooden platforms within their houses to keep important belongings safe from water.

“Those who have canoes have to put them into use whenever they want to go out; we are people who go to the river regularly to fish, so we are not so afraid of water,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Bayelsa Government has pledged to ensure that no life was lost in the floods currently ravaging the state.

The Commissioner for Information, Daniel Iworiso-Markson, who gave the promise in Yenagoa on Monday while commenting on the flood situation, said that with the proactive steps which the government had put in place, there was no cause for alarm.

He said that the government was working round the clock to ensure that those whose houses were submerged by the flood got immediate succour.

Iworiso-Markson urged the people not to panic, saying that the government was fully aware of their plight and would strive to forestall a recurrence of the 2012 flood disaster.

He said that the latest reports indicated that Egwe-ama in Brass Local Government Area (LGA), Imiringi, Ayama, Otuobhi in Ogbia LGA, Edwarie in Southern Ijaw LGA and Trofani in Sagbama LGA, among other communities, were affected by the flood.

He urged residents who lived in flood-prone neighbourhoods to work with the State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) and other relevant government agencies to facilitate their immediate evacuation from the areas in the event of flood incidents.