Not Prepared for Floods Amid Conflicting Weather Forecasts
By Ignatius Banda
BULAWAYO , Feb 8 , 2012 (IPS) – Sibongile Dube knows the devastation heavy
rain can leave in its wake. A villager in the lowveld area of Mberengwa in
Zimbabwe’s Midlands province, Dube’s home is one of many that were washed
away by flash floods last year.
“I am still rebuilding my home,” Dube told IPS, pointing to where she has
erected a hut that she says serves as her bedroom.
Across the small yard stands a shaky-looking grain storage bin, which has
become symbolic of the devastation that swept away thousands of tonnes of
grain in last year’s floods.
Hundreds of schools and villages were washed away amid criticism of Zimbabwe’s
disaster preparedness and effective early warning systems. This was despite
earlier warnings that the floods, which had already left a trail of
destruction in their wake in countries that lie along the Zambezi River in
Southern Africa, were headed for some parts of the country.
“We were never told that the water would be that bad. We lost livestock and
the grain we had harvested,” Dube said, highlighting the plight of thousands
of villagers who remain victims not only of natural disasters but also poor
early warning and disaster monitoring systems in Zimbabwe.
While rains have only begun to fall in some parts of the country, the
Zimbabwe Meteorological Services have given conflicting reports of when to
expect it to reach its peak. Initially the service first said December 2011,
but then revised this to early January, then again to late January.
Zimbabwe Meteorological Services chief, Tich Zinyemba, has also reversed an
adverse forecast issued that warned of imminent floods. He said in late
January that the cyclone, which had been expected to reach Zimbabwe last
month, had since moved back to Mozambique.
Zinyemba’s latest forecast came despite a warning issued by the Zambezi
River Authority that parts of the Zambezi River, which flows through
Zimbabwe, would experience floods and advised villagers to prepare for
evacuation to higher ground.
This week, experts from the government’s weather services department
announced the cyclone from neighbouring Mozambique was no longer headed for
Zimbabwe. While villagers are no longer being prepared for the possibility
of heavy downpours, for Dube and many others, the threat of rain destroying
their homes remains a real threat.
These conflicting weather reports have exposed the country’s lack of
preparedness for possible floods.
“We do not know anymore when the rains would fall and how bad it would be,”
Dube told IPS, expressing a popular sentiment here as many have lost faith
in the reliability of weather forecasts from the meteorological services.
The Civil Protection Unit, a government department responsible for, among
other things, evacuating of communities from flood areas, also issued a
flood warning last month. The unit has been severely criticised for failing
to respond in time to the distress of villagers like Dube, last year.
“There is lack of adequate expertise and the usual lack of resources that is
why we even fail to have such things as helicopters to assist our people
during floods,” Tymon Ruzende, a disaster preparedness expert who worked
with the Red Cross during last year’s floods, told IPS.
“But I also think there is little in terms of preparing communities deal
with the prospect of flooding. For example when it is already known the
waters will rise, communities must be told to move to higher ground, yet
others always resist this,” Ruzende told IPS.
This year, communities that lie along the giant Zambezi basin once again
find themselves at the centre of rising waters.
It is here in the Zambezi basin in areas such as Binga, an inaccessible and
remote district in northern Zimbabwe, where communities have previously been
victim of flooding despite clear signs that the banks would burst.
Jairos Lubimbi, a local councillor, said not much is being done to prepare
villagers in the eventuality of floods.
“People here have always lived with floods and it is something which the
authorities think is natural and they cannot do anything about saving lives,
grain and livestock,” Lubimbi told IPS.
Last month, the Zambezi River Authority told villagers living downstream on
the Zambezi to evacuate their homes, but villagers who spoke to IPS said
they were still in their homes because “they had nowhere to go.”
“They tell us to move to higher ground, but do not provide alternative homes
for us,” said distraught Taboka Sibanda, a villager.
Floods have already moved from Mozambique into South Africa and according to
some media reports, the rising waters have claimed up to 20 lives. Concerns
remain about possible localised flooding in Zimbabwe.
Experts say Zimbabwe’s shifting climate patterns that have moved the rain
season further into the New Year. They say that this has made it difficult
to prepare for possible floods as the country lacks state of the art weather
tracking systems. This comes amid calls by the United Nations for all early
warning systems to be community centred.