Nigerian police said Friday that officers had arrested seven suspects in connection with the massacre of dozens of villagers in central Plateau state.

State police spokesperson Alfred Alabo said security operatives had restored calm to the affected Kubwat and Fungzai villages in the remote Mangu district. He said police would continue to monitor the area to try to prevent more attacks.

Witnesses said gunmen invaded Mangu early Tuesday morning and opened fire on villagers. They also burned many houses before security forces arrived.

Residents said more than 100 people were killed, and they blamed ethnic Fulani militias for the bloodshed.

Alabo said that even before the attacks, tensions had been high in the area because of disputes between farmers and herders over grazing land.

In a phone interview with VOA, he said he was not sure of the death toll.

“It’s a place that was riddled with crisis,” he said. “You can’t just be jumping [to conclusions] and be giving figures. They told me over 30 persons at that time, so we’ll get more information.”

Residents said thousands of people who fled their homes to escape the violence had yet to return to the villages.

But Alabo said the situation had been brought under control. “We have so far been able to calm the situation in that general area,” he said. “But we’re still monitoring. We have some suspects already in custody presently with Operation Safe Haven.”

Communal clashes over scarce grazing land and water resources have plagued Nigeria’s central region for decades. Benue, Nasarawa and Plateau states are among the ones most impacted by the disputes.

On Thursday, rights group Amnesty International condemned the killings and called for accountability. Police have promised to continue investigating.

A Plateau state resident, who survived the attack and asked for safety reasons that his name not be used, said security officials arrived too late.

“It was something that I never expected to happen,” he said. “Many people were killed. It was a big tragedy, what I saw in that place. About 100 people were killed, many were displaced, and some are in the hospital.”

Nigerian authorities are struggling to control a wave of violence across the country.

On Tuesday, police announced they were investigating an attack last week in which gunmen killed 15 people in a farming community in Nasarawa state. Police said those killings appeared to be carried out in retaliation for the death of an ethnic Fulani herder who was attacked days earlier.
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Mass looting by armed men and civilians is making life an even greater misery for Khartoum residents trapped by fierce fighting between Sudan’s army and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), witnesses said.

While the RSF dominates the capital on the ground and the army conducts frequent airstrikes, the witnesses said police had simply vanished from the streets when the fighting started in Khartoum on April 15.

“Nobody protects us. No police. No state. The criminals are attacking our houses and taking everything we own,” said Sarah Abdelazim, 35, a government employee.

As mayhem grips Khartoum, the army accuses the RSF of looting banks, gold markets, homes and vehicles. The RSF denies the charge and has released videos showing its men arresting looters. The paramilitary force says some people wear RSF uniforms and steal to make them look bad.

Some witnesses said the RSF was stealing vehicles and setting up camps in people’s houses. The RSF also denies this.

More than 17,000 men who were jailed in Sudan’s two most dangerous prisons — Kobar and Al Huda — were released early in the fighting. Both sides blame the other for the prison break.

‘The Devil’s City’

“We are now living in the devil’s city. People are looting everything and neither the army nor the RSF nor the police, none of them want to protect ordinary people. Where is the state?”

said Mohamed Saleh, 39, a primary school teacher.

The fighting erupted after disputes over plans for the RSF to join the army and the chain of command as part of a political transition. It has caused some 200,000 to flee to nearby countries and more than 700,000 have been displaced inside Sudan, triggering a humanitarian crisis that threatens to destabilize the region.

Intense battles have continued to rage in Khartoum and its sister cities of Bahri and Omdurman despite Saudi and U.S.-brokered talks between the army and the RSF in Jeddah aimed at securing humanitarian access and a cease-fire.

Most attention is focused on the battles, not the chaos which is demoralizing the population, or the rapidly depleting supplies of food, cash, and other essentials that drive much of the looting.

Huge groups have been seen looting mobile phone, gold, and clothes stores.

Factories, including a wheat mill belonging to DAL Group, the country’s largest conglomerate, were looted in Sudan’s main industrial zone, which contains key food and industrial manufacturers.

“They were brandishing machetes, they wave them in the air,” said Qassim Mahmoud, a bank general manager who passed through the zone as he fled Khartoum for Egypt and saw people carrying away sacks of wheat and large appliances.

Three commodities and storage facilities were burned down in Omdurman. On Thursday, people could be seen in a video stealing mattresses and clothes and loading them onto trucks. Others used donkey carts.

“Yesterday thieves came and burgled my house in Omdurman. Who do I complain to,” said Ahmed Zahar, 42, a trader.

Many Khartoum residents have put posts on social media seeking assistance in retrieving stolen cars.

At one bank where money had already been looted, people were also seizing televisions and furniture, said a Reuters witness.

Aid warehouses have also been targeted by the looters.

The medical aid agency Medicin Sans Frontier, also known as Doctors Without Borders, one of few entities continuing to provide aid in Khartoum, said armed men had broken into its warehouse in Khartoum on Tuesday and taken two cars filled with supplies.

 
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More than half of the world’s large lakes and reservoirs have shrunk since the early 1990s, chiefly because of climate change, intensifying concerns about water for agriculture, hydropower and human consumption, a study published Thursday found.

An international team of researchers reported that some of the world’s most important water sources — from the Caspian Sea between Europe and Asia to South America’s Lake Titicaca — lost water at a cumulative rate of about 22 gigatonnes per year for nearly three decades. That’s about 17 times the volume of Lake Mead, the largest reservoir in the United States.

Fangfang Yao, a surface hydrologist at the University of Virginia who led the study in the journal Science, said 56% of the decline in natural lakes was driven by climate warming and human consumption, with warming “the larger share of that.”

Climate scientists generally think that the world’s arid areas will become drier under climate change and wet areas will get wetter, but the study found significant water loss even in humid regions. “This should not be overlooked,” Yao said.

Scientists assessed almost 2,000 large lakes using satellite measurements combined with climate and hydrological models.

They found that unsustainable human use, changes in rainfall and runoff, sedimentation, and rising temperatures have driven lake levels down globally, with 53% of lakes showing a decline from 1992 to 2020.

Nearly 2 billion people who live in drying lake basins are directly affected, and many regions have faced water shortages in recent years.

Scientists and campaigners have long said it is necessary to prevent global warming beyond 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) to avoid the most catastrophic consequences of climate change. The world has already warmed about 1.1C (1.9F).

Thursday’s study found unsustainable human use dried up lakes such as the Aral Sea in Central Asia and the Dead Sea in the Middle East, while lakes in Afghanistan, Egypt and Mongolia were hit by rising temperatures, which can increase water loss to the atmosphere.

Water levels rose in a quarter of the lakes, often as a result of dam construction in remote areas such as the Inner Tibetan Plateau.
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Arab heads of state are slated to attend Friday’s Arab League summit in the Saudi Red Sea resort town of Jeddah, including the president of Syria for the first time in over a dozen years. The crises in Syria and Sudan are expected to be major topics of discussion at the meeting.

Arab leaders began arriving in Jeddah Thursday in the lead-up to Friday’s 32nd annual Arab summit, due to be hosted by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman.

Among those expected to be present is Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who has not attended an Arab League summit since 2010, the year before the outbreak of the Syrian civil war. 

Arab League foreign ministers restored Syria’s membership in the body at a meeting in Cairo earlier this month. 

Syrian Foreign Minister Faisal al-Miqdad told journalists in Jeddah Wednesday that Syria is a key player in the Arab League.

He said that Syria welcomes any Arab efforts to resolve the conflict in his country and that Damascus must not be absent from any Arab summit meeting.

Arab League Deputy Head Hossam Zaki told Saudi-owned al-Arabiya TV that Friday’s summit would discuss the return of Syrian refugees to their country and the rebuilding of Syria, But he said the latter question was not “an easy issue to resolve, given the sanctions that Western countries have placed on Damascus.”

Zaki also noted that the Arab peace initiative with Israel, which dates back to 2002, “remains unchanged from its original formulation.”

Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal Bin Farhan welcomed Syria’s return to the Arab League in remarks Wednesday, saying that Syria’s participation in Arab decision-making will be a key factor in resolving many thorny issues going forward.

He said that the world today is facing serious problems and threats, and that it is important that Arab states unite to address those challenges together in unison and do more to join ranks to make the region safe and secure.

Khattar Abou Diab, who teaches political science at the University of Paris, told VOA that the summit will showcase both the Saudi crown prince and the Syrian president.

He said that this year’s summit is meant to confirm Mohammed Bin Salman’s leadership position in the Arab world and to show that he is able to bring Arab leaders together in a symbolic or colorful way, while Syria’s Assad is more of a divisive figure.

Abou Diab also noted that, according to Jordan’s foreign minister, the summit will conclude with a call for Syria to take back political refugees and get a handle on drug smuggling from its territory to other Arab states, in exchange for Arab financial support.

Arab League head Ahmed Aboul Gheit said the conflict in Sudan is also on the agenda of Friday’s summit, adding that bringing some semblance of peace back to the country is a top goal of Arab leaders.

He said that Sudan is a strategic Arab country and that the igniting of a military conflict in the cities and streets of Sudan in such a sad way has pained the hearts of most Arabs and that the summit will try to restore calm to the country to allow the pursuit of political dialogue.

Saudi-sponsored peace talks between Sudan’s warring sides have taken place in Jeddah in recent days, so far without any reported progress.
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The death toll following clashes between herders and farmers in central Nigeria’s Plateau State has jumped from 30 to 85, a local official said Thursday.

Following the attacks on Monday in Mangu district, “85 bodies (were) recovered,” the chairman of the local government council Daput Minister Daniel told AFP.

He said some people were wounded, without giving a number, while “several houses have been destroyed and many people are now displaced.”

The State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) also said “thousands of people were moving on the road” following the attacks.

The region lies on the dividing line between Nigeria’s mostly Muslim north and mainly Christian south and has for years struggled with ethnic and religious violence.

It was unclear what prompted the latest violence, but tit-for-tat killings between herders and farmers often spiral into raids on villages by heavily armed gangs.

Juni Bala, director of search and rescue at SEMA, said their team visited the area on Wednesday.

“We could see houses that were still burning,” Bala told AFP. “We couldn’t go further because (the) youth were angry.”

Police said on Thursday that they had arrested five people in connection with the violence.

“Heavy security presence has been deployed,” police spokesman Alfred Alabo said in a statement. “So far calm has been restored to the general area of Mangu Local Government (Area) while monitoring continues.” 
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On a sandy lot below a Khartoum apartment building, helmetless Sudanese soldiers in a mishmash of uniforms raised their fists as machine gunners blasted away from atop two small trucks.

It was another day in a war that has not stopped for more than a month, and continued Wednesday, as the United Nations reported that more than half of the country’s people, 25 million, need aid and protection, Ramesh Rajasingham, head of the U.N. humanitarian agency’s Geneva bureau, told reporters there.

Analysts say neither side — the army led by chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces led by his former deputy Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo — has been able to seize an advantage on the battlefield.

And the capital, Khartoum, has become a war zone.

In front of a five-story apartment building, some soldiers on Tuesday stood casually with rocket-propelled grenade launchers while another danced about with a belt-fed machine gun while the ground around him appeared littered with dozens of spent large-caliber shell casings.

Soldiers shouted as machine guns fired from atop a pickup truck, a small, armored car and a tank beside some trees near a billboard for a car showroom.

The clear blue sky was marred only by faint dark smoke rising behind them.

In other parts of the capital, long mounds of dirt are piled beside roads where military trenches have been dug.

With bullets flying, Rajasingham said millions remained confined to their homes, unable to access basic services and health care.

More than 5,000 people have been injured.

In Africa’s third-largest country, many areas remain untouched by the fighting but still suffer its effects, with soaring prices and shortages of fuel.

“Petrol is not available now and the price has increased on the black market. People can’t transport their vegetables,” said Abu Bakr Abdullah, 27, a farmer in River Nile state.

Another farmer, Qamar al-Bashir, 52, complained that four years have passed since longtime autocrat Omar al-Bashir was toppled, but “they have not been able to form a government.”

A coup in 2021 by Burhan and Dagalo derailed a fragile transition to civilian rule.

“Enough!” the farmer said. “You can’t move the country forward, do you move it backwards? And at the end you take us to war for your own personal interests.”

They “are losers,” all of them, he said.

Last Thursday the warring sides signed in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, a commitment to respect humanitarian principles and allow in badly needed aid.

“However, reports of attacks continued and, on 12 May, violence in El Geneina reportedly escalated,” a U.N. report said.

Toby Harward, of the U.N.’s refugee agency, reported an “extremely disturbing” situation in El Geneina, the West Darfur capital.

Hundreds of civilians have been killed in militia attacks on residential areas and street battles between “community-aligned forces.” There has also been looting and destruction at markets, camps for displaced people, and other locations, he wrote on Twitter.

In Khartoum North, a factory that produced food to treat malnourished children burned down, according to the U.N. children’s fund.

Still, Rajasingham voiced hope the Jeddah agreement was having some effect.

He said fighters had pulled back from some of the health facilities that were previously occupied and highlighted an uptick in aid deliveries.

“We do need much more,” he said.

Sudan’s war is expected to be a major agenda item during the Arab League summit on Friday in Saudi Arabia.

Heavyweights in the pan-Arab bloc are divided on Sudan, with Egypt supporting Burhan and the United Arab Emirates, according to experts, seen to be backing the RSF.
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Officials in Cameroon say 18 separatists have disarmed and surrendered to authorities in the biggest defection since the conflict broke out in 2017.  Authorities say the English-speaking rebels, including two self-proclaimed generals, were hiding across the border in neighboring Nigeria. Leaders of the separatists, who want to break away from French-speaking-majority Cameroon, have vowed to track down and kill the defectors. 

Cameroon’s military says 18 fighters, including David Dibo, alias General Baron, and Ekpe Jerome, alias General JB, surrendered and handed over their weapons in Mundemba Tuesday.

Mundemba is a town in Cameroon’s English-speaking southwest region that shares a border with Nigeria.

Since 2017, separatists have been fighting to carve out an independent state called Ambazonia in Cameroon’s English-speaking Northwest and Southwest regions.

The self-proclaimed General Baron says he convinced the fighters to surrender. He says Cameroon military firepower was more than they could bear and that he saw several hundred fighters killed by government troops within the past six years.

He says he is pleading with scores of fighters, who are still hiding in the bush, to drop their weapons and be pardoned by the Cameroon government. He says fighters hiding on the border with Nigeria should hand their weapons to Cameroon police or government troops as he did, without which they will be killed by either hunger, disease or in battles.

Speaking with Cameroon’s state broadcaster, CRTV, on Tuesday, Baron says the fighters handed their weapons to Cameroon military and government officials in Ndian, an administrative unit where Mundemba is located.

Gilbert Guibai Baldena is the highest Cameroon government official in Ndian. He has assured the former fighters that the government will protect them.

“General Baron and all of you{fighters} ran away to Nigeria because it is difficult to continue,” Baldena said. “Tell the others who are still in the bush to come out. The head of state (Cameroon’s president) wants every Cameroonian to take part in the reconstruction and development of the country”

Baldena also warned that separatist fighters who refuse to surrender and drop their weapons will be killed by Cameroon government troops,  

Following their surrender, the government says the former fighters will be taken to the center for Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration, or DDR in Buea, capital of Cameroon’s English speaking southwest region.

The government says the defections are the largest number of fighters to surrender in a single day and the first time two dreaded generals dropped their weapons and surrendered to Cameroon’s military.

It is also the first time rebels operating in Cameroon and hiding across the border in Nigeria have said they are wanted in the two countries, according to the government.  

The rebels say that when they attack government edifices and troops in Cameroon’s Southwest region they would escape from Mundemba across the porous border, through thick forests to Nigeria’s Cross River State.

In addition to Cameroon’s government coming after them, they say Cross River State officials declared them wanted and ordered Nigeria’s military to kill or arrest them, a claim VOA could not independently verify.

But on several occasions, Nigeria’s local media reported that suspected Ambazonia secessionist militants from Cameroon attacked Cross River State border villages.

Crisis24, a Quebec-headquartered international security management group, says that in one of the attacks on Bashu, a community in the Boki Local Government Area in May 2022, rebels from Cameroon killed up to 20 civilians who had fled the separatist crisis in Cameroon’s Southwest region where Mundemba is located.

Separatists on social media, including Facebook and WhatsApp, say they will attack and kill all fighters who resign and join DDR centers created by Cameroon’s central government in Yaounde. The government says fighters who surrender will be pardoned, trained to create businesses and reintegrated socially.

Battles between Cameroon government troops and western separatists escalated to armed conflict in 2017. Cameroon English speaking separatists are fighting to carve out an independent English-speaking state from the French majority nation.

The International Crisis Group estimates the conflict has killed about 6,000 people and displaced more than half-a-million. 

 
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Gunmen on Tuesday targeted a convoy of U.S. Embassy staffers in southeastern Nigeria, killing two of its local workers and two policemen, the police said. 

The assailants opened fire on the convoy along a major road in Ogbaru local government area in Anambra State, one of the epicenters of separatist violence in the region, according to police. “The hoodlums murdered two of the Police Mobile Force operatives and two staff of the consulate, and set their bodies ablaze and their vehicles,” said Tochukwu Ikenga, a police spokesperson in Anambra. 

A joint team of security forces was deployed to the scene but arrived only after the assailants escaped with two other police officers and one of the drivers, Ikenga added. He said no U.S. citizen was on the trip. 

The U.S. State Department said its personnel in Nigeria are working with the nation’s security agencies to investigate Tuesday’s attack. “The security of our personnel is always paramount, and we take extensive precautions when organizing trips to the field,” the State Department said in a statement. 

The nature of the trip embarked upon by the U.S. Embassy staffers in Anambra was not immediately clear, nor was the number of people in the convoy. 

The attack in Atani town, located 60 kilometers (37 miles) from the state capital, further raised concerns about the safety of residents and travelers amid the separatist violence that has become rampant in Nigeria’s southeastern region in recent years. 

Authorities have blamed the violence on a separatist group known as the Indigenous People of Biafra, which is leading a campaign for the region to break away from the West African nation to form an independent country. The separatists have become more violent in the past few years as they continue to demand a referendum. 

Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari has rejected the calls for a referendum, insisting that the unity of Africa’s most populous country — and the continent’s largest economy — is not negotiable. 
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Gunmen attacked villages in troubled north-central Nigeria, killing 29 people and razing houses, survivors and authorities said Tuesday.

Many villagers remained unaccounted for Tuesday evening after the attack in Plateau state, residents said. It was the latest incident in a spiral of violence mainly targeting remote communities in the West African nation.

The gunmen targeted three villages in Plateau state’s Mangu local government area late Monday night and killed several people either with gunfire or after setting their houses ablaze, resident Philip Pamshak said.

“As I am talking to you, they are still attacking people. The tension is still high, and there are places the bandits still control, so people are not able to go and check if there are others killed,” Pamshak said.

Plateau Governor Simon Lalong said he was disturbed by the attack and directed security forces to search for the suspects and prosecute them, according to a statement issued by his spokesman.

“He [the governor] describes this as yet another attempt by crises merchants and criminals to return the state to the dark days of pain and agony,” said Makut Macham, Lalong’s spokesman.

Such attacks have become rampant in many parts of Nigeria’s northern region, where several armed groups target villages with inadequate security, either killing or abducting residents and travelers for ransom.

Arrests are rare in such attacks, for which no group typically takes responsibility. However, authorities have in the past identified many of the attackers as former pastoralists who took up arms after decades of conflict with farmers over limited access to land and water.

The security crisis has led to thousands of deaths and defied several government and security measures in the last year.

After the latest killings in Plateau, Lalong directed the emergency response agency to visit the affected communities “to bring succor” to victims and their families, many of whom have either fled the area or have lost their homes, adding to Nigeria’s worsening humanitarian crisis.
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South Africa’s main opposition party is demanding to know why there is a high-level defense delegation in Moscow discussing increased cooperation and combat readiness. The news comes just days after the U.S. ambassador accused South Africa of selling weapons to Russia in violation of its claims of non-alignment in Moscow’s war on Ukraine. 

The Democratic Alliance’s spokesperson on defense and lawmaker Kobus Marais, says the visit led by the chief of the South African army, Lieutenant General Lawrence Mbatha was unannounced.

“This once again demonstrates the ANC government’s insensitivity to our diplomatic and trade dilemma,” said Marais. “The visit is the latest in a string where the South African government clearly and unashamedly demonstrates its support for Russia.”

U.S. Ambassador to South Africa Reuben Brigety made headlines last week when he said he would bet his life that South Africa had supplied arms to Russia.

Marais, who is the shadow minister for defense and military veterans, says the Democratic Alliance has intelligence on what Brigety referred to. He says something worthy of being guarded by men in uniform was loaded onto a Russian cargo ship, the Lady R, when it was docked at Simon’s Town Naval Base in December.

“We also know that the U.S. is probably the most advanced in terms of observation technology and specifically with regard to satellites,” said Marais. “We know that they can zoom into any port or airport or even battlefield and tell you exactly what color shirt and pants you are wearing so I assume that they have got their own intelligence that can be used to see from above.”

Marais says the unconfirmed rumors that ammunition was taken onto the Lady R seem plausible because the Russian military is struggling in Ukraine.

“What we know is what has been reported that they are in dire straits in terms of ammunition,” said Marais. “But that is why we need to establish and know what they have loaded. We know it was not consumables like apples and pears.”

In WhatsApp messages, Ukraine’s Ambassador to South Africa Liubov Abravitova wrote that it is “disturbing” how Russia is eager to make South Africa appear to be on its side and even more disturbing that South Africa is not postponing engagements such as the delegation’s trip to Moscow.

Referring to a statement by South Africa’s military that the visit to Moscow was planned well in advance, Abravitova said previously made agreements between Russia and South Africa “cannot justify the intensification of military contacts with the country that violates all possible rules of international law and U.N. Charter.”

South African officials are trying to decide whether to host Russian President Vladimir Putin at the BRICS summit it is holding for leaders of its partner countries in the bloc: Brazil, Russia, India and China. 

The International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant for Putin on charges of war crimes involving the alleged abduction of children from Ukraine.

Political analyst Professor Bheki Mngomezulu of Nelson Mandela University says if he had his way, he would ask Putin not to come.

“Simply because with him coming here that will put us in a very awkward situation,” said Mngomezulu. “At the moment, we are signatories of the Rome Statute which therefore means that we are obliged to arrest him.”

The BRICS summit takes place in August.
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The U.N. refugee agency, UNHCR, says that the number of people who fled from Sudan to Chad has doubled to 55,000 in the last week, and many are women and children. Henry Wilkins spoke to Sudanese refugees who just arrived at a newly created camp in Borota, Chad.
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Nigerian authorities are warning citizens of intense flooding ahead of this year’s rainy season.

Typically, Nigeria sees significant rainfall between June and October, and last year the country saw its worst flooding in a decade, which the United Nations said killed more than 600 people and displaced about 1.4 million.

The threat of intense rains earlier than expected will be bad for vulnerable communities, the U.N. said, especially those who are still suffering from last year’s flooding. 

In the closely built temporary sheds in northeastern Nigeria’s Gwoza Borno State, thousands who fled conflict find shelter. The camp is among more than 70 supported by the United Nations’ International Organization for Migration, or IOM. 

Last year, severe flooding hit the camp and ravaged many shelters, displacing — for a second time — some 10,000 people. 

Now, IOM is constructing drainage canals in the camp ahead of the rainy season.

“In the camps, they already have so little to themselves and when the rains come in as we saw last year, they destroyed essentially everything,” said Prestage Murima, IOM’s deputy chief of mission.

Last year’s flooding was fueled by unprecedented heavy rainfall in combination with the release of excess water from Lagdo dam in northern Cameroon. 

The National Emergency Management Agency, or NEMA, said about 600 people were killed and 3 million were affected across 31 out of Nigeria’s 36 states.

Now, NEMA is warning of a significant risk of heavy flooding across the country in the coming months. 

“Our goal is to minimize loss, because we know that they do not have enough resources to do this for themselves and they’re already in a vulnerable state,” Murima said. “So, we want to maintain their dignity as much as possible. We encourage the community members themselves to come in and do the work.” 

In addition to drainage canals, IOM is promoting hygiene and awareness campaigns on the risks of disease outbreaks — especially cholera. Flooding last year triggered a deadly cholera outbreak in the area.

Borno State is the most impacted by armed conflict in Nigeria. Millions of displaced people are in staggering need of humanitarian assistance, especially food. 

In another camp near Nigeria’s border with Cameroon, residents like Jennifer Abajidda said they’re still facing the impact of last year’s floods. 

“Flood and elephants destroyed our plants and because of that some of us go to Cameroon to farm to get some money for food,” she said. “Some others take big risks to go to the bush to get some firewood to sell.”

U.N. Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator Matthias Schmale said climate change is to blame and that authorities must improve spending on infrastructure.

“There’s no doubt what we’re seeing here is the impact of climate change and so, of course, there needs to be serious investment into climate change adaptation and mitigations such as planting mangroves and bamboos along roads and reinforcing riverbanks,” Schmale said.  

With more publicity and awareness about extreme weather, authorities hope to reduce the impact of flooding in Nigeria this year.  
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