Pakistan floods: Sindh province awaits more deluges and devastationon August 28, 2022 at 5:10 pm

One of Pakistan’s southern provinces, Sindh, is bracing itself for worse to come as the country deals with catastrophic floods.

Deluges from swollen rivers are heading for lower-lying areas, officials say, threatening more misery for millions.

The floods have killed nearly 1,000 people across Pakistan since June, while thousands have been displaced – and millions more affected.

In Sindh, the message in every village the BBC visited was: “Send help.”

In this province – which has a population of almost 50 million – there has been a little reprieve from the rains. But it will take more than a few days of sunshine to make life right again.

This year’s floods have been devastating – and their impact is far from being fully realised.

The infrastructure was already basic in many rural communities. Many of the roads are not tarred, and some bridges are worn out after years of little maintenance.

But this can’t just be blamed on poor infrastructure.

Pakistan’s officials, who have dealt with floods many times before, say the hell unleashed by the heavens was nothing they could have prepared for.

“People around the world talk about climate change and something it’s only a theory,” said one official, who has been running a relief operation in Larkana, a badly-hit city.

“We are seeing for ourselves on the ground that climate change is happening. We’ve never seen such rains in one year…now we need to think about how we build for the future – how do we even start?”

The torrents from swollen rivers in the mountainous north are due to arrive in the coming days. But the devastation is not isolated to Sindh province.

One man told the BBC his daughter had been swept away by a flooded river in northern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.

“She told me: ‘Daddy, I’m going to collect leaves for my goat,'” said Muhammad Fareed, who lives in the Kaghan Valley.

“She went to the bank of the river and a gush of water followed and took her away.”

The US, UK, UAE and others have contributed to a disaster appeal, but more funds are needed, officials say.

According to reports by the Dawn newspaper, Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has announced a grant of 10bn rupees ($45m) for those in the most affected Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.

Every flood-affected family would be given 25,000 rupees ($112), Mr Sharif said, which would be disbursed within a week.

Mr Sharif said 33 million people had been hit by the floods – about 15% of the country’s population.

He said the losses caused by floods this season were comparable to those during the floods of 2010-11, said to be the worst on record.

Pakistan’s Foreign Minister, Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari, echoed Mr Sharif’s calls for more aid.

“I haven’t seen destruction of this scale, I find it very difficult to put into words… it is overwhelming,” he told Reuters.

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