Flood: Two persons swept off in Abuja
Two persons were allegedly washed away by flood in Abuja in the early hours of Monday.
During an early morning downpour, D’ Gallery gathered that the natural disaster occurred at Trade More Estate in the Lugbe area of the nation’s capital.
The victims, who were yet to be identified at the time of filing this report, were said to be passing by when they fell into the flood and got washed away.
D’Gallery also gathered that so many houses, including Lugbe Police station, were also submerged by the flood.
Several residents were said to be trapped in their homes, while others rescued their children and salvaged their property.
As at the time of filing this report, the number of casualties and values of property destroyed could not be confirmed as there was no official reaction from relevant authorities.
We gathered that flooding at the Abuja Trade More Estate is perennial because the location is on a flooded terrain.
Recall that between 2022 and 2023, there were several cases of flooding in the area in which property worth millions of naira were lost.
The FCT Administration and the FCDA, we gathered, attempted a solution to the flooding in 2023 when they marked about 116 houses for demolition to ensure drainage, but the estate executive went to court and stopped the move.
As widely reported in the media then, an Abuja High Court in Jikwoyi, presided over by Justice Zubairu Mohammed, issued the order stopping the demolition, following an ex-parte application that the estate filed through its team of lawyers led by Prof. Mike Ozekhome (SAN).
Specifically, the court restrained the FCTA, FCDA and its agents from demolishing or trespassing on any property in the estate.
Before then, a total number of 116 buildings had been marked for removal as they were said to be in flood terrain, hindering water from flowing freely away.
It is also on record that the FCT Emergency Management Agency, under the then leadership of Mohammed Abbas, served several warnings and asked residents to relocate as that portion is a flood path and flows water down to Gurara. But the warnings were not heeded.
