Malaysia: Tens of thousands of people have been evacuated from their homes as a result of deadly floods brought on by torrential monsoon rains in southern Malaysia. According to officials, there have been at least four deaths in the past week.
During the monsoon season in Malaysia, a number of states in the south experienced massive floods, forcing over 41,000 people to flee their homes.
Officials claim that the floods, which have killed at least four people in the past week, are among the worst that the country has ever experienced.
How is the situation with the floods in Malaysia?
Of the six Malaysian states affected by the flooding, Johor in the south, which borders Singapore, is the most severely affected.
More than 1,000 people were forced to leave their homes in five other states as a result of the rising waters, and nearly 40,000 people have fled their homes in the state. The national disaster management agency says that authorities have set up more than 200 relief shelters for people who have been displaced.
The torrential rain, which has flooded roads, submerged cars, damaged homes, and forced many shops to close, has hampered relief efforts in Johor and elsewhere.
Since Wednesday, at least four deaths were reported by police. Among the fatalities are an elderly couple who drowned and a man whose car was washed away by floodwaters.
According to them, the most recent death occurred when a 68-year-old woman left an evacuation center in the town of Segamat in Johor and drowned near her flooded home.
What is to blame for the floods?
During Malaysia’s annual monsoon season, which runs from October to March, floods are common and frequently result in mass evacuations and deaths.
However, environmental officials have attributed the current flooding to climate change and human activities, claiming that it is unusually intense.
According to the French news agency AFP, Vincent Chow, president of the Malaysian Nature Society, the floods were the worst to hit Johor since 1969.
“At this point, the weather is erratic. “The weatherman has been outwitted by climate change,” he stated.
In remarks made to the news agency, the president of the environmental organization Friends of the Earth Malaysia, Meenakshi Raman, also suggested that humans were a part of the large-scale flooding.
“Our rivers and drains are chock-full of soil erosion, and they cannot contain the increased volumes of rainfall,” she stated. “Forest and land clearings in the upper reaches of our rural areas, towns, and cities.”
She went on to say, “There is little green left to act as sponges, so the over-concretization of areas also leads to overflows of water.”
