CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC: Homeless thousands in urgent need of aid after heavy rains, minister says

[ This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]

BANGUI, 10 Aug 2005 (IRIN) - Central African Republic Social Affairs Minister Marie-Solange Pagonendji N’Dakala has appealed for local and international aid to thousands of people made homeless by heavy rains in the capital, Bangui.

"Their living conditions are unbearable," she said on Tuesday on national radio.

The director of cabinet in the Ministry of Social Affairs, Georges Antoine M’Baga said, "We have no means of helping the victims, the ministry has no money to respond to such disasters."

The programme coordinator of the CAR Red Cross Society, Alphonse Zarambaud, said on Tuesday that roughly 6,500 people were homeless. Worst affected were those in the city's neighbourhoods of Sapeke, Bruxelles, Kangala and Petevo, along the southern banks of the Ubangui River. No death has been reported. However, Zarambaud said there were "enormous risks" of an epidemic because latrines and boreholes were overflowing.

"The homeless are exposed to diseases such as malaria, yellow fever and cholera," he said.

One of the victims, a child-mother who wished only to be identified as Clara, said: "It is now more than two days that my child and I have been sleeping without food and covers. I have a fever and my baby is unwell."

Zarambaud said the International Committee of the Red Cross, together with the CAR and French Red Cross societies agreed on Monday to provide blankets, tents, food and medicine to the victims.

Zarambaud said the situation could worsen with more rainfall expected in September and October. He said the disaster was predictable given that so many people lived in the swampy part of the capital. Some 100,000 people were made homeless under similar circumstances in 2001.

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