Maputo, Mozambique – When Emilia Machel, 30, and her three children rushed to the Chiaquelane site for displaced people on the afternoon of January 17, much of her hometown of Chokwe in Mozambique’s Gaza Province was already flooded.The Limpopo River, which begins in neighbouring South Africa and flows into Mozambique, had reached dangerously high levels after heavy rain fell on the Southern Africa region from late December to mid-January.Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of list“We knew there would be floods,” said Machel. “We watched on television that there would be flooding.”Machel, who supports her family by selling tomatoes and onions, first came to Chiaquelane, a long-term settlement for displaced people, at age four in 2000 during one of the deadliest floods in Mozambique’s history. “The reason why we came this time is because we had been here in 2000 and again in 2013. It is a safer area,” she said.This season, heavy rains and overflowing rivers have resulted in floods, which authorities say are some of the worst in decades, killing more than 150 people and affecting an estimated 800,000 people in the southern and central provinces of Mozambique.Although the rain has subsided and water levels in river basins have fallen, large swaths of land remain flooded, according to humanitarian workers.“In some places it feels like you’re flying over the ocean because t …
