MOZAMBIQUE 107
Zambeze flood
Aid vultures circle, but
Mozambique says situation under
control, so no international appeal
Cardoso verdicts confirmed
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News reports & clippings no. 107
from Joseph Hanlon ()
16 February 2007
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ZAMBEZE FLOOD
85,000 DISPLACED BUT
SITUATION UNDER CONTROL
More than 85,000 people have been displaced by the Zambeze River flood; 36,000 are in accommodation centres and the rest with friends and relatives. River levels have reached a temporary peak, as water released from the Cahora Bassa dam last weekend has now arrived downstream. Since then, discharges from the dam have been reduced somewhat.
The Zambeze floods every few years, and this flood seems not that unusual. Many roads running parallel to the river are cut by flooding, but the ferry across the river at Caia continues to operate. Contrary to early reports, some work on the new bridge also continues.
Paulo Zucula, the highly respected new director of the Natural Disasters Institute (INGC, Instituto Nacional de Gestao das Calamidades) is now based in Caia and was interviewed yesterday by the BBC (attached).
He told the BBC ‘at present the situation is under control’ and there will be no international appeal for help. The government has logistic capacity and food had been pre-positioned at Caia before the floods.
AID VULTURES CIRCLE,
EXAGGERATING THE FLOOD
Meanwhile, the press and aid agencies have been exaggerating the crisis. The BBC headlined a story Wednesday ‘Mozambique seeks urgent flood aid’ when, as Zucula said yesterday, there will be no international appeal. The article went on to say that ‘rescue workers fear [that the] Cahora Bassa [dam] threatens to overflow.’ That is total nonsense. Indeed, the dam management at the weekend actually reduced the amount of water being released. The dam has never overflowed, even in the serious flood of 2001.
Many NGOs have sent teams to Mozambique to evaluate the crisis, which they hope to use for fund-raising, and they have been falsely predicting that Zucula would launch an appeal. For the INGC, the problem may now be dealing with disaster tourists.
In Portugal, NGOs have been collecting goods for flood victims, only to realise that it will cost more to ship than they are worth.
BUT SOME HELP IS NEEDED
Although Zucula stresses that the INGC has events under control and that no mass appeal will be launched, in a press briefing yesterday he said ‘international help and internal solidarity is welcome, particularly the logistic component, tents, and ways to distribute drinking water.’In general, these items are available in Mozambique and neighbouring states, so the main shortage is money to buy them. But, with the agreement of the INGC, the World Food Programme is distributing some food and Oxfam is flying in a water and sanitation team. At least two other international NGOs are also active in the area.
After the 2000 floods, the British Disasters Emergency Committee gave high praise to Oxfam for its emergency water and sanitation support. But it was also quite critical of the way Oxfam flew in too many expatriates which meant that ‘some of Oxfam’s emergency actions were taken without an awareness of the specific Mozambican context’.
LOOKING AHEAD
Zucula stresses that the rainy season has another month to run. If there are more heavy rains, the floods could get worse. For the moment, however, the situation is under control.
And there is the unexpected. The floods have displaced many crocodiles, and there are becoming a serious hazard in some places, according to Noticias.
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CARDOSO MURDER
VERDICT CONFIRMED
A Supreme Court panel this week rejected the appeals of the men convicted for killing journalist Carlos Cardoso. Both the convictions and sentences were upheld. Meanwhile, Noticias reports that Anibalzinho, the head of the assassination team, is to be moved from his special cell in the national police headquarters to the ‘maximum security prison’, from which he was twice allowed to escape.
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