‘Rain, rain, go away’, a short nursery rhyme, suggests how unwelcomed the rainy season is to everybody, especially children.
Also known as the wet season, the rainy season is the time of year where the majority of a country’s or region’s annual precipitation occurs. In Nigeria, rainfall is experienced throughout the year, with most significant rainfall occurring from April to October, and with minimal rainfall occurring from November to March. It is, however, briefly interrupted in August in the southern part of the country.
Rainy season in Nigeria is a blessing and curse. This is because like other works of nature, there are many advantages and disadvantages of rain. On one hand, the people get a break from the scorching sun, temperatures drop, and the crops get enough water. Then, on the other hand, plans get ruined, traffic intensifies, and one gets wet and cold.
The weather in Nigeria is very easy to understand. Just like everyone learned in the elementary school, Nigeria, like the rest of West Africa and other tropical lands, has only two seasons – the dry and rainy seasons.
Rainy season in Nigeria is experienced in two different ways. In Southern Nigeria, the rainy season features heavy and abundant rain. The annual rainfall received in this region of the world is usually high. The rainy season in Nigeria differs by region. Rainy season is different in northern and southern Nigeria.
In southern Nigeria, light rainfall begins in March, with the peak of the rainy season being June and July. In June and July, it rains cats and dogs. A brief break is experienced in August, to begin again in September, and the season does not end until late October.
In northern Nigeria, rainy season does not come until June. Rainy season in Nigeria is the planting season, and with the dry season comes the harvest. After the rainy season comes the dry season, which is accompanied by a dust-laden air mass from the Sahara Desert, locally known as the harmattan season in Nigeria.
Residents of the country would describe the weather conditions in Nigeria as violent and apologetic. This is because the weather is never on ones’s side.
Last year, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) disclosed that more than 2.5 million people in Nigeria were in need of humanitarian assistance following severe flooding that ravaged the country. The agency also stated that 60 per cent of those affected were children.
It further revealed that about 1.5 million children were at increased risk of waterborne diseases, drowning and malnutrition due to the flood.
UNICEF further explained that the floods which had affected 34 out of the 36 states in the country, had also displaced 1.3 million people, while over 600 people have lost their lives and over 200,000 houses have either been partially or fully damaged.
“Cases of diarrhea and water-borne diseases, respiratory infection, and skin diseases have already been on the rise. In the North-eastern states of Borno, Adamawa and Yobe alone, a total of 7,485 cases of cholera and 319 associated deaths were reported as of 12 October. As rains are expected to continue for several weeks, humanitarian needs are also expected to rise,” a statement by UNICEF said.
The flooding in Nigeria has also affected the education sector as it left behind trails of destruction in schools. It led to schools being closed down, children dropping out of school and school absenteeism as some school buildings were used as evacuation centres.
For example, in Anambra State, the government had announced the closure of all the primary and secondary schools in the flooded communities and other flood prone areas in the state.
Some towns in Ogbaru Local Government Area were flooded due to the overflow of the River Niger. Also, some communities in Anambra West and other LGAs were affected.
Commissioner for Education in the State, Prof Ngozi Chuma-Udeh, during the period, in a public service announcement released by her aide, Chioma Unachukwu, said that the closure of the schools became necessary to ensure the safety of the schoolchildren.
“I am directed to convey the Honourable Commissioner’s approval for the closure of all schools in riverine and flood prone areas in the state with immediate effect in compliance with the already published 2021/2022 Special Academic Calendar for riverine and flood-prone areas in the state,” it partly read.
Also, the Bayelsa State Government had to direct all public primary, secondary and private schools in the state to suspend all academic activities and embark on a flood break until Friday, November 11, 2022.
The directive became necessary to safeguard the lives of teachers and students as the flood had continued to submerge parts of the state.
Reports have it that flood took over parts of Adagbabiri, Swali, Azikoro, Amassoma, Agudama Epie, Igbogene, Sagbama Communities and Nembe Kingdom in the State.
In Delta State, the Delta State University of Science and Technology, Ozoro, had to be shut down for two weeks by the government as a result of the ravaging flood that has negatively affected most parts of the institution.
The state Commissioner for Higher Education, Dr. Kingsley Ashibuogwu, announced the closure of the university during an emergency visit for on the spot assessment of the impact of the flood on the institution.
The Commissioner noted that with the level of the flooding, it was no longer safe for students to remain on campus.
Faculties mostly affected by the flood included that of Administration and Management, Computer Science, and Environmental Sciences.
Others included the Faculty of Agriculture, Mass Communications, the University Health Centre, the library, generator plant house, Staff Club, as well as the administrative building of the university.
The Commissioner expressed hope that within the two weeks duration, the flood would have receded.
He added that the measure was taken in the best interest and safety of students and workers in the university community and assured students and the school management that lectures and academic activities would resume as soon as the flood receded.
With the reports of this magnitude last year, education experts had worried that the destruction by the flood will increase the number of out-of-school children in Nigeria which the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) disclosed to be about 20 million.
“I feel the flood will take us back a lot especially when it pertains to the out-of-school children in the country,” Edwina Obom, an education specialist, said.
She, therefore, urged the Federal Government to ensure that steps are being taken to either prevent the natural disasters or minimise the issues.
This advice is important as the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) has warned Nigerians to expect severe flooding this year.
The Director General of NEMA, Mustapha Ahmed, during an event in Abuja in March, said that there had been seasonal climate predictions and annual flood outlooks by the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NiMet) and the Nigeria Hydrological Services Agency (NIHSA).
He said last year’s flood disaster in the country was an eye-opener for NEMA, and warned that the agency would spread early warning messages and signals to states, local government areas and Federal Capital Territory (FCT).
“We will not keep quiet. We want them to know that there will be flooding this year,” he said.
At the beginning of the year, the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NiMet), has, in its 2023 Seasonal Climate Prediction (SCP), disclosed that the rainfall Onset date is predicted to be earlier than the long-term average in most parts of the country.
The NiMet Director-General, Prof. Mansur Bako Matazu, during an unveiling of the 2023 SCP stated this on the issue of this year’s flooding.
“Definitely, we have peak rainfall between July to September and in such times, because of high soil moisture, we expect flash floods around cities and we are also expecting riverine floods in those areas that are flood-prone,” he added.
