Jo'burg rescuers hard at work in Pakistan

A team of 11 rescuers from the Johannesburg emergency services have arrived in Pakistan on a relief mission to the flood-stricken country, an official said on Saturday.

“We landed in Pakistan on Friday at about 3pm and we’ve been briefed about the situation,” said emergency services spokesperson Percy Morokane.

The country’s flood-damaged roads and infrastructure were also a “challenge”.

“Over a million children, most of them five-years-old, and half a million women have been affected by the floods.

“In all four major provinces about 131 health facilities, hospitals and clinics have been destroyed.”

“On Tuesday and Wednesday we will be visiting relief operational centres where there is resource distribution.”

He said that between Friday and Saturday his team were already “hard at work”, attending a number of security briefing sessions and studying the situation.

“We will be starting on Monday to visit some of the affected area with a view of sharing expertise and experience.

The team would return to South Africa on Thursday evening.

The floods began in the north-west of the country about a month ago with the onset of monsoon rains and have spread toward the southern coast, inundating vast swathes of prime agricultural land and damaging or destroying more than one million homes.

More than eight million people are in need of emergency assistance across the country.

The United Nations, the Pakistani army and local and international relief groups have been rushing aid workers, medicine, food and water to the affected regions, but were unable to reach many people, the Associated Press reported. - Sapa