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Willis Omulo,a flood victim and climate change activist at Aluora Makare CBO poses in what used to be his compound. Behind him are submerged houses in Chuowe Village. Credit: Leopold Obi.After spending months strapped under water, buildings that once defiantly stood along Chuowe Beach in Homabay, on the Kenyan shore of Lake Victoria, now seem set to surrender to the unlikely fate of never being inhabited again. Those that called the semi-permanent structures home would have loved to have kept living there, but apocalyptic floods made their choice for them.
The rising waters began in early 2020, and more than 200,000 people were displaced in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania - the three countries relying on the Africa’s largest fresh water body. According to the Lake Victoria Basin Commission, the lake hit a new record level of 13.42 metres – marginally higher than the 13.41 metre mark recorded in 1964.
The rains in the region were unusually heavy due to the Indian Ocean Dipole, a weather phenomenon caused by differences in sea surface temperatures between the eastern and western tropical Indian Ocean, according to Dr. Lydia Olaka, a geoscientist at the University of Nairobi,.
More than a year on from the worst flooding, many people remain without a home, or any sense that help is coming.
Washed away
“The flash floods were so fast and strong that we only rescued our children and a few belongings. Everything else was lost,” Alice Kiche, a fish dealer and mother of eight from Chuowe village, told me.
Her two-bedroom bricked house was marooned and destroyed by the floods.
On that night, she recalled, everyone was comfortably asleep, and nothing out of the ordinary was anticipated. Then suddenly the lake swelled, before furiously tearing its ways into the homes and farms that sat nearby. Her poultry and 13 cows were drowned by the ravaging floods that shook the village.
The villagers thought the floods would disappear in a week or two. But more than a year later, Kiche and her three daughters-in-law remain without a permanent place to call home.
“We were staying in a classroom at a nearby school. But moved out when schools reopened,” she explains, adding that all her plots have been swallowed by the new part of the lake.
Before the floods, the beach was a very a lively spot, a fish landing bay and a convenient market for dealers like Kiche. Yet now it has been submerged by waist-high waters, sinking all the business in the process.
It’s not just those that rely on the lake for their livelihoods that have been affected. Like Kiche, farmer Elijah Ng’ong’o, 54, has spent seven months living in his neighbour’s kitchen.
Towards the end of 2019, as farmers in Kenya prepared for planting during the October-December short rains, Ng’ong’o and his fellow villagers also prepared their farms. All went well until extreme rainfall came and flooded and swept the farms away, leaving farmers hungry and homeless.
“We are living in very desperate conditions. I’m a farmer who doesn’t like living at the mercy of others. But I’ve become helpless after floods drowned all my harvest,” he says.
Higher Ground
The flood victims say the government promised them building materials. But over 12 months later, they’re still waiting. It was only two weeks ago that the government released funds to reconstruct schools destroyed by the floods.
Apart from destroying infrastructure, farmland and properties, the floods also increased the spread of pollution and potential for disease.
Prof Richard Muga, health chief executive officer in Homabay, says the area was lucky to have escaped a public health crisis amid the floods and COVID-19 pandemic. The lake’s backwash flooded toilets, which posed a deadly risk to the communities who lack piped water. He tells me the county had to spend millions of shillings in distributing water treatment tablets to avert water borne diseases.
Chuowe Vilalge has been submerged by floods and the expanding lake. Villagers have been forced to abandon the homes and seek refuge elsewhere. Credit: Leopold Obi.So far, the national government has provided little help beyond advising residents to move, says Willis Omulo, a flood victim and environmental activist at Aluora Makare CBO.
“The government keeps telling us to move to higher grounds, yet they are not telling us where on the higher grounds they have reserved lands for us”, he says.
And experts say this is unlikely to be a one-off occurrence. The high water levels in the lake will be more frequent in the future due to heavy rainfalls, Dr Olaka warns – barely giving the region time to recover from one crisis, before another hits.
Leopold Obi is an award-winning science and environment journalist based in Nairobi, Kenya. He mainly writes for the Daily Nation and Business Daily. Find him on twitter @finallyobi.
This post was funded by a climate investigation grant awarded to From A Climate Correspondent by the European Federation for Science Journalism (EFSJ) and funded by the BNP Paribas Foundation.
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Must reads from the region
Studying the deadly storms at Lake Victoria, Sophie Mbugua, The Star
On Lake Victoria, deadly thunderstorms build up at night as fishers go out. The International Red Cross estimates that between 3,000 and 5,000 fishers lose their lives annually in the violent storms. This article explores how climate change contributes to the issue, and what needs to be done.
Nairobi concrete jungle turning city into oven, Leopold Obi, Business Daily
Thanks to rising temperatures and the urban heat island effect exacerbated by concrete developments, average air temperatures in Nairobi have increased from 18.8°C in the 1950s to 19.5°C in 2000s. Climate change is only going to make the problem more unbearable for one of Africa’s fastest developing cities.
Experts - Why the Water Levels of Rift Valley Lakes Are Rising, Stella Cherono, All Africa
Some of Kenya’s lakes are overflowing and others are drying up. Why? Tectonic activity, increased rainfall, and rising temperatures all play a part. As geologist grapple the issue, the Rift Valley lakes appear to be reclaiming territories they had lost millions of years ago.
Who should care for the forest? In Kenya, the question sparks violence, Geoffrey Kamadi, CS Monitor
This article explores an increasingly important issue: what happens to indigenous communities that live in forests which have become a battleground for anti-deforestation campaigns and carbon sequestration projects? “We have now become synonymous with evictions from our ancestral land,” says Daniel Kobei, a Mau-Ogiek community representative, who recently saw 300 homes destroyed by the Kenyan Forestry Service.
What else I’ve been watching
And now for something completely different. Kenya has been experiencing lots of climatic and environmental stresses, which can be too much to report about. I unwind by listening to music or just watching movies. I’m currently watching Emily in Paris, a comical drama series about an American who despite not being able to speak French travels to France for work. If you need some light relief, check it out.
Who we are
From A Climate Correspondent is a weekly newsletter run by four journalists exploring the climate crisis from around the globe. We regularly also feature guest writers.
Lou Del Bello is an energy and climate journalist based in Delhi, India.
Jocelyn Timperley is a climate journalist based in San José, Costa Rica.
Purple Romero is an climate change and human rights journalist based in Hong Kong.
Mat Hope is investigative journalist based in Nairobi, Kenya.
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