By John Ugo, Awka
Indigenes of Umuzu community where more than 200 families were sacked by flood in Ogbaru local government area of Anambra State are missing on the list of beneficiaries of relief materials being distributed by officials of the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) and the State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA).
Both intervention agencies have Commenced the distribution of relief materials to flood victims in Anambra state.
A total of 61,070 persons who were displaced by the flood disaster were captured in the list but non of the displaced persons from Umuzu community were allegedly captured in the list.
According to the list made available by the two bodies, only seven local government areas were shortlisted out of the eight council areas and Umuzu community was not on the list.
Umuzu community was one of the worst hit areas during the flood and over two hundred families in the community were missing for sonme time during the flood.
Coordinator Umuzu Flood Committee and Coordinator Children of Farmers Club Prince Chris Okwuosa said “We have made representations before the state government and the relevant agencies involved and even during the flood , no medical team visited Umuzu as was promised by the Commissioner for Health as well as the Chairman Ogbaru local government area.
“This is a community that had over two hundred families missing and exposed to cholera epidemic and the authorities did not find it proper to include Umuzu”.
A letter to the Deputy Governor of Anambra state Dr Onyekachukwu Ibezim, stated that the community demanded for items which include “Provision of fishing gear and other tools to victims’ households,
Creating a value chain that will off take harvested fish from them for further processing.”
They also demanded for the “appointment of coordinators to oversee these activities in the affected Communities and council areas”.
The people noted that, “The Children of Farmers Club with her wide range of experience in coordination of various agricultural related empowerment activities in rural communities as well as having facilities for fish processing is best suited to coordinate these activities across the state”
