The MP for Tamale North constituency, Alhaji Alhassan Suhuyini, has described as “depressing, devastating and heartbreaking” a flood disaster that hit large parts of the Northern region two days ago after heavy rains and stormy weather.
The disaster occurred Tuesday morning after the five-hour downpour drenched many parts of the regional capital, Tamale, killing three persons including two children and uprooted dozens from homes.
Properties of unquantified proportions including livestock and other assets were lost leaving victims in uncertain situations and hopeless circumstances.
Communities within the Tamale North constituency like Fou, Taha, Gumani, Kalpohini, Nyanshagu, and several others were most affected with many buildings swamped by floodwaters causing massive damage.
Many roads were ruined and rendered inaccessible. At Fou, Taha and parts of Gumani, houses were submerged, scores of dwellers trapped and belongings washed away by the winding passage of the waters.
The MP on an assessment mission just a day after the disaster, visited closely all the constituents, house after house and commiserated with victims over their loses.
Alhaji Suhuyini immediately after arrival into the constituency was accompanied by some party executives in the area to a burial site where the body of a victim, 59-year-old teacher, was later interred.
He also chanced on a sad drama where some residents were refusing to handover the body of a seven-year-old boy, another fatality in the disaster, found in the Fuo neighborhood to the police for investigations.
The MP hurriedly intervened and ensured the body was released to the police for an autopsy at the Tamale Teaching Hospital and was later handed back to the family. The body was also later buried in accordance with the tenets of Islam.
He expressed worried over the inability of the National Disaster Management Organization (NADMO) in the region to provide aid packages for the affected residents, but said he was going to collaborate with his colleagues in Parliament and benevolent individuals and groups to assist the victims reorganised.
“That is the challenge now because as we all know we have a National Disaster Management Organization so if you have a situation where those who are supposed to manage the disaster themselves need management then you wonder as a Member of Parliament where to take the cry of the people to, but I believe that there are well-wishers out there- NGOs and other institutions that would be touched by the plight of these people and together we will partner them to see what kind of support we can give them.
“When we went to the Fuo village, you saw how a room that fell rendered a mother and children homeless and you can just imagine how exposed they are to mosquito bites and consequent malaria that they are prone to acquire, and that can tell you that things city dwellers or people who are comfortable enough may consider less important as little as a mosquito net is something that is useful in this circumstance and we welcome whatever support that anybody wants to give and through us Insha ‘Allah we will be that channel through which reliefs can reach out to the people.”
“I’m also speaking to my colleagues in Parliament, Hon. A.B.A Fuseini (Sagnarigu constituency MP) and Members of Parliament Tamale Central and South and we are putting our heads together to see what we can also do on our own to support”, an emotional Suhuyini said.
Some of the victims he visited gave frightening accounts of how they escaped the disaster and circumstance under which their properties were totally ravaged.
