Floods and landslides kill scores of people in DR Congo’s Kinshasa | Tellwell Newspaper
Tellwell Newspaper, Abuja – Nigeria:
At least 100 people have been killed and dozens injured in widespread floods and landslides caused by heavy rain in the capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Kinshasa.
The prime minister, Jean-Michel Sama Lukonde, said officials were still searching for more bodies.
“We came to assess the damage and the primary damage we see is human,” Lukonde said on state television on Tuesday.
About 12 million people live in the 24 neighbourhoods of Kinshasa that were hit by the floods, according to three local officials who told the Associated Press that people were killed, houses submerged and roads ruined.
In the Ngaliema area, more than three dozen people were known to have died so far, said the area’s mayor, Alid’or Tshibanda.
In another area, five members of one family died, some by electrocution.
“It is a just calamity,” said Pierrot Mantuela, 30, whose mother, nine-year-old daughter and three brothers were killed. “It’s sad to lose all the members of my family.” He said he was spared because he was working on Monday night when the rain began.
Officials said much of the destruction happened in houses built on plots without official permission. “They have no documents. They are chased away but they always come back,” Dieumerci Mayibazilwanga, the mayor of Mont-Ngafula, said of people building unauthorised houses.
In 2019, flooding and landslides killed at least 32 in and around Kinshasa.
AP
