Nsanje district commissioner (DC) Gift Rapozo has called on defiant communities to relocate from flood-prone areas as there are growing fears that the district may experience floods this rainy season.
In an interview on Friday, he said the communities still living in flood-prone areas should heed government’s call to move upland considering that disasters have already started taking place in other districts as a result of the rains.
“The rainy season has started and some districts have already been hit by disasters as a result of heavy rains and strong winds.
“Nsanje District itself experienced a devastating hailstorm on Thursday night which destroyed some infrastructure,” said Rapozo.
He said despite the district not receiving enough rains in most rainy seasons, the district experiences floods due to water that comes from other districts such as Mulanje, Thyolo and Blantyre.
The DC singled out some people in Traditional Authority (T/A) Nyachikadza who are yet to move upland, saying they have to do so quickly because their area is prone to floods.
“I wonder why people of Nyachikadza are giving a deaf ear to our call. We have been warning them, but they seem to be defiant,” said Rapozo.
In a recent interview, T/A Nyachikadza admitted that most of his subjects were still in flood-prone areas and will relocate after harvesting their crops.
Efforts to relocate communities in Nsanje from flood-prone areas have always faced resistance with most people saying the land they occupy is more fertile than the land which they are being told to relocate to.
