Authorities remain concerned about heavy rains that have caused flooding as the rainy season has yet to reach its peak.
At least 49 people have died and thousands have been displaced in Nigeria after heavy rains caused flooding in the northeast of the country, the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) said.
Three northeastern states, Jigawa, Adamawa and Taraba, have been hit hard by the floods, with 41,344 people displaced, NEMA spokesman Manzo Ezekiel said on Monday.
In 2022, Nigeria suffered its worst flooding in more than a decade, killing more than 600 people, displacing around 1.4 million and destroying 440,000 hectares (1.1 million acres) of farmland.
“We are entering the peak of the season, particularly in the northern part of the country, and the situation is very serious,” Ezekiel told Reuters.
The floods have also destroyed agricultural land, affecting some 693 hectares (1,712 acres) of farmland. Nigeria is battling double-digit inflation, which has been fueled by high food prices.
Heavy rains have exacerbated problems in the agricultural sector, where farmers are abandoning their farms in the northeast due to repeated attacks by armed individuals.
Many officials remain concerned and are bracing for more destruction as the rainy season has yet to peak.
“We have September and October ahead of us. It rains a lot more in September than in August, so only God knows what the situation will be like when that time comes,” Haruna Mairiga of the Jigawa Emergency Management Agency told Al Jazeera.
According to Al Jazeera's Ahmed Idris, reporting from Nigeria, the government says 110 kilometres (68 miles) of embankments have been built, but flooding continues to claim lives and property, diverting scarce government resources intended for development.
The government said this year that 31 of the country's 36 states were at risk of “major flooding.”
“We also have information about high tide in the upper Niger River countries before Nigeria,” Ezekiel said. “All of these are flowing into Nigeria. We are starting to see a manifestation of our predictions.”
