Between Wednesday 27th and Saturday, 30th, 2024, authorities have confirmed that at least 20 Ugandans have lost their lives to flooding and mudslides, a direct consequence of the strong rains that have hit the country in the recent days.
Among the calamities that have broken headlines is the mudslide in Bulambuli district, where at least 20 have been confirmed dead.
Here, hundreds are still missing after the mudslide swept at least 15 homesteads.
Uganda Police Force (UPF) says that at least fifteen (15) others are admitted in hospitals with various injuries.
With minimal government response, local residents are using homes to dig the covered village in search of their loved ones.
When the Prime Minister visited the area, she condoled with the bereaved families, attributing the tragedy to a 10-hour downpour, and thanked Uganda police and UPDF for the rescue efforts “despite the impassable roads.”
The Uganda Red Cross Society, the major hand in the rescue efforts has set up a holding center at Bunambutye, where they are providing food, shelter, health and sanitation care for the rescued.
Bulambuli is in Eastern Uganda, and same geographic location with Bududa, the district that recorded the worst mudslide in recent Ugandan history when over 300 people were buried by the mud, in 2010.
The Eastern Region of Uganda is topographically hilly and also very fertile. This fertility and constant rains, is ironically the reason people do not want to leave the area, even though they are aware of the imminent mudslides.
Food production and bounty harvests are reliable.
In the same Eastern Region, River Nabuyonga flooded on the Wednesday the 27th, cutting off transportation to and from the area to Northern Uganda.
The same river flooded in August 2022, causing death of 20 people as they attempted to cross the bridge.
This time though, they waited for the water levels to subside. No life was reported lost by publication of this story.
In the Northern region, a taxi got stuck on the Pakwach-Owlinyo road in Nwoya district when River Tangi flooded.
Two boats were dispatched by the Uganda People’s Defense Forces (UPDF) to rescue the people in the taxi.
One of the boats capsized and an engineer on the rescue mission drowned, according to the UPDF, four people from the taxi are still missing.
The Uganda National Roads Authority (UNRA) conceded that the River Tangi has burst its banks twice this year, but several efforts to contain the flooding have failed.
In August 2024, about 40 people lost their lives in Kasangati Town Council of Wakiso district when the kiteezi landfill collapsed after a morning rain.
