DAKAR, Senegal (AP) — A government spokesperson in Ivory Coast confirmed Wednesday that flooding has taken the lives of at least 59 people in the country this year.
Following a Cabinet meeting, spokesperson Amadou Coulibaly addressed reporters, stating that “the council deplores the particularly high death toll of 59 this year.”
The latest disaster struck Monday, when a combination of floods and landslides — triggered by several days of heavy rainfall — hit the capital cities of both Ivory Coast and Ghana, killing at least 24 people and leaving others unaccounted for.
Coulibaly did not provide a breakdown of how many deaths were specifically tied to the most recent flooding event in Ivory Coast.
In Ghana’s capital, Accra, entire buildings and roads were swallowed by floodwaters on Monday, cutting off multiple neighborhoods in the city as well as the nearby city of Tema.
Within Ivory Coast, the sustained rainfall caused flooding that killed more than a dozen people, with the majority of victims located in the Abidjan municipalities of Attécoubé and Yopougon, according to the Minister of National Cohesion Myss Belmonde Dogo.
Coulibaly called on residents to heed government safety guidelines and evacuate any zones that authorities have identified as high-risk.
Fatal flooding is a recurring problem across parts of Africa. The World Meteorological Organization notes that Africa is one of the regions most exposed to extreme weather events globally, even though the continent accounts for only a small share of worldwide greenhouse gas emissions.
