The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) has released 150,000 dollars in emergency, first-response aid for Sierra Leone after learning that devastating floods and mudslides left hundreds dead on Monday.
“IOM is ready to work with Sierra Leone’s Government in any capacity it can to respond to this terrible event,” IOM Director-General William Swing said on Tuesday from Geneva.’’
Similarly, IOM’s West Africa Regional Chief, Richard Danziger said from Dakar
that the UN agency was joining Sierra Leone authorities and the UN country team in conducting damage assessment throughout the impacted region near the capital, Freetown.
Hundreds of citizens were reported dead with many more missing after mudslides and floods tore through several communities while search teams expect to discover more remains in the coming days and weeks.
Access to potable water and widespread homelessness are expected to be immediate concerns for thousands of people in the capital, whose population exceeds one million.
The UN migration agency said flooding had wreaked havoc in Sierra Leone in the recent past.
Last week, IOM and the Government of Japan presented Sierra Leone’s first water purification facility to the resettled community of Mile 6, Koya Rural.
Located about 50 kilometres outside Freetown, it provides safe drinking water to the resettled population after flash floods ravaged the capital in September 2015. (NAN)
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