Malawi MPs offer meager support to flood victims

As the budget review session got underway in Malawi's parliament on Tuesday (02.02.2015), environmental and human rights campaigners were clamoring for the government to take action.

They wanted relief support for the victims of Malawi’s heavy rains and floods which have killed more than 100 people and displaced over 600,000.

Behind the figures are individual stories of distress and misery. The flooding began last month (13.01.2015) after “the Mwamphanzi River overflowed,” according to Collins Nelson Tizola, Head Teacher of Mfera Primary in Chikwawa North.

“We were teaching in our classrooms when the flooding began. We saw pupils running out of their classrooms towards the Mwamphanzi River to watch the flood,” Tizola added.

Jayaraj Gopalan Nair, chairman of an Indian charity group in Malawi, told DW the government must take the plight of the flood victims seriously.

“Disasters will always happen”, he said. “But the government should be prepared before they do. If they'd had a weather forecasting plan, this disaster would not have affected Malawi this much.”

Relief efforts for victims still trapped in remote villages have been hampered by bad road conditions. The roads have been severely damaged by the floods and aid supplies are still stalled at distribution points.

The rains have continued in the southern districts, leading to forecasters’ prediction of further flooding in the region.

Previous and current victims of the flooding have been calling for a disaster management plan from parliament. Parliament has been debating the issue but has failed to come up with a bill. Some MPs argued enacting such a policy should be their top priority even if they are currently engaged in a midterm budget review.

Chikwawa North parliamentarian Harry Thompson said parliament is ready to debate the much touted disaster policy.

“It floods annually”, he told DW. “One year we are flooded, the next year we have drought, so the people of Shire Valley are suffering all the time.”

He maintained he had signed a declaration with other parliamentarians during their campaigns to push for the relief management bill, but admitted their efforts have not had positive results.

Malawi’s Vice President Saulos Chilima has said his government intends to submit to parliament its disaster management bill, but did not say when it will do so.

The flooding has forced the government to scale back its economic growth projection. Gross Domestic Product increase is now expected to fall under the 5.8 percent initially forecast by authorities.

The flooding has caused damage estimated at millions of dollars.