Storms and flooding have killed at least 13 people in the central Mozambique province of Sofala since torrential rains hit Southern Africa last week, state-run radio reported on Tuesday.
Eight of the victims were struck by lightning and five drowned in floods unleashed by the storms, Radio Mozambique reported.
The main highway was inundated, cutting off Sofala’s Buzi district from the rest of the country. In the province’s Dondo district, the Pungue River burst its banks, flooding agricultural fields belonging to 520 families.
Heavy rains also caused extensive damage in Nampula, Manica, Tete, Gaza and Inhambane provinces. Flimsy houses were swept away, leaving thousands of impoverished families homeless.
The incessant rains inundated low-lying neighbourhoods in Mozambique’s second city of Beira, forcing hundreds of families to seek refuge in churches, schools and relatives’ homes.
Power supply was disrupted in some areas.
Mozambique, one of the world’s poorest countries, suffers from frequent flooding. In 2000 and 2001, floods killed more than 800 people, left hundreds of thousands of homeless and severely damaged roads and bridges.
Heavy seasonal rains have also caused flooding in Malawi, killing one person and displacing more than 1 000 in recent days.
Crops were destroyed and livestock swept away in the southern Nsanje district, already at the epicentre of critical food shortages affecting up to five million Malawians.
In Zimbabwe, torrential rains swept contaminated sewage and drain water into drinking sources, triggering a cholera outbreak that has killed at least seven people in the south-eastern Chikomba district. — Sapa-AP