Over 22,000 inhabitants of Massangena district, in Mozambique’s southern Gaza province, face the risk of starvation due to a lack of food supplies caused by access roads being cut by rain, the district government said.

Gracinda Macamo, the administrator of Massangena, told public broadcaster Radio Mozambique on Tuesday that trade in the district is almost paralysed because goods transport is struggling to guarantee food supplies.

“We only have food for the next five days ,” Gracinda Macamo said.

Roads between Massangena and other points in Gaza province are cut due to the torrential rain falling in southern Mozambique, she added.

In Inhambane province, also in the south, several road accesses and bridges are also impassable due to rain, said the delegate of the National Roads Administration (ANE) in the province, Dady Mendes.

Mendes said that ANE had mobilised 20 contractors to repair the problematic stretches.

Mozambique is in the middle of a rainy and cyclonic season, which takes place between October and April, with winds coming from the Indian Ocean and flooding from the basins of southern Africa.

This year thousands of people have been affected by bad weather.

The most severe were storm Chalane at the end of the year and cyclone Eloise in January, with a total official death toll of 19, but reports from local authorities point to double that.

Source: Lusa via clubofmozambique