The Director-General, National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), AVM Muhammad Mohammed (rtd) on Wednesday, said over 900 houses were destroyed by flood in 13 out of the 14 local government areas of Zamfara State.

Mohammed also disclosed that a 7-year-old boy died as a result of flooding in Gummi Local Government Area of the state.

The Director-General disclosed this to newsmen in Gusau on Wednesday during the Federal Government’s flood Advocacy visit to the state.

Mohammed said the advocacy visit was necessitated by the recurring annual flood across the country.

“The incidents also rendered many households homeless forcing them to take refuge in neighboring communities.

“Two bridges linking various communities to Gummi town and other parts of the state, and neighbouring Sokoto and Kebbi States also collapsed, leaving residents trapped.

“We activated temporary IDPs camps to provide succor to the affected victims pending the arrival of relief intervention from the Federal Government.

”Though climate change has been largely blamed for this increasing phenomenon, it is our responsibility as government and people to evolve strategies to minimize losses through adherence to warning alerts, early preparation and proper response.

‘’Unfortunately, the predicted floods have occurred in many parts of the country, therefore, it is imperative to activate all measures against the prediction as the season moves towards the peak.

“We are all aware this year, the highly probable flood risk areas in Zamfara are Bakura, Maradun, Shinkafi, Zurmi and Gumi Local Government Areas,’’ he added.

He urged the state government to take necessary proactive measures to mitigate the disaster, NAN reports.

The delegation comprised of officials from the Federal Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development and NEMA.

The Federal Government has said it has not come to a point where it is convinced that schools should be reopened for academic exercise after their closure due to the Coronavirus pandemic.

The Minister of State for Education, Chukwuemeka Nwajiuba, disclosed this on Thursday in Abuja at a meeting of the Presidential Task Force (PTF) on COVID-19 with the Northern Traditional Leaders Committee (NTLC) on National Primary Health.

The meeting was presided over by the Minister of Information and Culture on behalf of the Chairman of PTF and Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Boss Mustapha, NAN reports.

The meeting was to seek the support of the traditional rulers towards preventing community spread of COVID-19.

Responding to a question from Sultan of Sokoto, His Eminence Sa’ad Abubakar, on school reopening, Nwajiuba said the federal government is still evaluating the situation.

“At the moment, we have not come to the point where we can say we are convinced that schools can manage themselves and reopen comfortably.

“Our teams have gone out, and we will use the whole of this week and next week to do a proper evaluation.

“We are going round to see the level of compliance, but most importantly, we are waiting to get an update on all the facilities in every part of Nigeria.

“So, it is a work in progress,” he said.

The minister said the government strongly believes in the opinion of experts that 15 percent of transmission of the pandemic is from the school environment.

“We believe expert opinion that a school system is a suspect place for transmission, and that is why we are working with them, particularly on guidelines.

“We are suggesting that classes be remodelled if there are not enough classrooms for social distancing,

“We can do this system where some can come in the morning, maybe the junior classes and the senior classes can come in the afternoon.

“We are also working out guidelines such as the washing of hands because the school must go on at one point,” he said.

The minister said they experimented with the system in the past weeks during the West African School Certificate Examinations and the Joint Admission Matriculation Examination.

“We are lucky thus far because we only recorded an incident in Gombe where a child contacted COVID-19.

“We quickly isolated him, and he recovered in time to join the class back.

“But that showed that these places are sources of spread,” he said.