The National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) on Wednesday said the 2022 flood disaster in the country was the worst ever, while also revealing it had spent N112.13 billion from consolidated accruals and ecological fund utilisation since 2011 .
This came after the displeasure expressed by the House of Representatives committee on Ecology when Ahmed Mustapha, the director general of NEMA, said that the agency reached out to over 1,427,370 persons displaced by the flood disaster across the nation.
Unlike other appropriated finance, balances from the funds are rolled over to a next fiscal year, Mustapha said when he appeared before the committee which is investigating the total consolidated accruals and utilisation of ecological fund.
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The director-general told the committee that documents for the 2010 expenditure were not available as they were destroyed during the #ENDSARS protests, and police extract to that effect has been obtained.
He lamented that 2022 flood disaster was the worst flood disaster in the history of Nigeria, saying it was far more devastating than the 2012 flood which was hitherto considered unprecedented in the country’s history.
At the height of the flood situation in Nigeria, a total of 612 persons lost their lives, 3,219,780 persons were affected, 1,427,370 persons were displaced and 2,776 others suffered various degrees of injuries.
“A total of 181,600 houses were partially damaged and 123,807 houses were totally damaged. A total of 176,852 hectares of farmland were partially destroyed while 392,300 hectares of farmland got totally destroyed as a result of the floods,” Mustapha said.
The NEMA Boss also said the provision of food and non-food items for immediate relief and building materials to facilitate long term rehabilitation of those affected by flood was ongoing.
Story adapted from BusinessDay.
