(Nairobi) Some 893,000 people have been affected by severe flooding in South Sudan and more than 241,000 people have been displaced by bad weather, the UN Office of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) announced on Thursday.
“Floods continue to affect and displace people across the country,” he said. “Heavy rainfall and flooding have left 15 main roads impassable, restricting access” to residents of this country, one of the poorest in the world.
According to OCHA, some 893,000 people have been affected by the floods in 42 counties and the Abyei administrative region, an area claimed by Sudan and South Sudan.
More than 40% of those affected live in Unity and Warrap states in the north, according to the same source.
The more than 241,000 people displaced “in order to find higher shelter” come from 16 counties and the Abyei region, OCHA said.
South Sudan is facing the worst flooding it has seen in decades, according to humanitarian organizations.
The World Bank indicated the 1er October that the floods were worsening “an already critical humanitarian situation, marked by severe food insecurity, economic decline, ongoing conflict, epidemics, and the repercussions of the conflict in Sudan”.
The war in Sudan has resulted in the departure of more than 797,000 people to South Sudan, according to September figures from the World Bank, 80% of whom are South Sudanese.
A peace deal in 2018 ended five years of a deadly civil war in South Sudan, but the young country, which gained independence from Sudan in 2011, remains undermined by power struggles, corruption and facing a dramatic humanitarian situation.
According to the 2018 peace agreement, the country is led by a government of national unity including rivals Salva Kiir (president) and Riek Machar (first vice-president), with the mission of carrying out a “transition” ending with elections.
But progress in key areas of the agreement (drafting a constitution, creation of a unified army, etc.) remains slim, and the government is also facing a cruel lack of resources.
It lost its main source of income after a pipeline allowing it to export its oil was damaged by fighting in neighboring Sudan, where a war has left tens of thousands dead since April 2023.
The government has also just announced a further two-year postponement of the first elections in the country’s history, scheduled for December.