The pounding rains and the rising water levels at Lake Naivasha has posed a great danger to the residents living near the lake with their houses submerged in water and dangerous animals like hippos straying to their homes.
According to the Disaster Management Officer in Naivasha, Joyce Ncece, 4,000 people have been displaced so far and the number is suspected to rise due to continuous rains that has since left the residents bearing the brunt wrath nature.
Former Head of the Government Delivery Service (GDS) Peter Mbae, said that there is a humanitarian crisis in the estate that is home to tens of flower farm workers while blaming the national and county governments for not acting as hunger ravages most families.
For the past three months, the water levels in the lake has been rising gradually thus worsening the situation in which homes, latrines, schools, churches and even a police post had been flooded.
Mbae threatens to stage protests if the government fails to intervene. “We are giving the national and county governments 48-hour notice to intervene over this crisis; failure to which we shall be forced to take to the streets.
The parliamentary committee on land had previously visited the estate and recommended that the legal land owners be compensated.” He said.
The locals have decried that despite residents purchasing the land legally, there are some claims that they were living on riparian land.
The locals have since call up on the county government to assist the affected families for fear of contracting disease as latrines had also flooded.
Residents are more worried at the moment because the Schools have closed and children came back to a more horrifying scenario where homes are filled with water and the residents are going hungry in the same house since they cannot afford rent in the other estates.
They further hinted that hippos stray into their homesteads, posing a grave danger.
Ms Ncece, said that the vulnerable families will continue to receive support from a multi-sectoral team had been formed.
“Over 4000 families have so far been affected, and we are offering them transport to relocate to other estates, and the situation is getting worse by the day,” she said.
Locals are pleading with the leaders whom they elected to step up and help them alleviate the menace of Lake Naivasha which broke it’s banks.
