A curfew will be established Tuesday evening in the French archipelago of Mayotte, to avoid looting, after the devastating and deadly passage of Cyclone Chido, a “tragedy” according to President Emmanuel Macron who will visit the site “in the coming days “.
• Also read: Cyclone Chido kills at least 34 people in Mozambique
• Also read: [EN IMAGES] Cyclone Chido: relief efforts are underway in Mayotte, battered and lacking everything
Three days after the passage of this cyclone, the most intense that Mayotte has experienced in 90 years, the Indian Ocean archipelago is lacking everything, and residents are alarmed by the deteriorating health situation.
The curfew will be in place from 10 p.m. to 4 a.m. local time for security reasons, to avoid looting, the Interior Ministry explained.
AFP
“Around twenty deaths” have been recorded, but “the toll” for the moment “is not yet established,” declared French Prime Minister François Bayrou on Tuesday before the National Assembly in Paris.
In front of the deputies, he also mentioned “200 seriously injured” and “1,500 injured who are in relative emergency”. The prefect of Mayotte had mentioned “certainly several hundred” victims, perhaps “a few thousand” after Chido’s visit to this poorest department in France.
The count is all the more complicated because Mayotte is a land with a strong Muslim tradition and, according to Islamic rites, many of the deceased were probably buried within 24 hours.
the Red Cross has no news of 200 volunteers, according to the humanitarian organization.
In Mozambique, Cyclone Chido killed at least 34 people, injured more than 300 and destroyed more than 20,000 houses in Mozambique, the National Institute for Risk and Disaster Management announced on Tuesday.
“Totally devastated”
Mayotte “is totally devastated”, explained the Minister of the Interior Bruno Retailleau, in Reunion, a French territory 1,400 km away as the crow flies from Mayotte, where he was returning from a trip, specifying that “ 70% of residents were seriously affected.
AFP
The minister also announced the arrival “in the coming days” of 400 additional gendarmes to lend a hand to the 1,600 gendarmes and police present on the archipelago, while specifying that there had “not really been any looting ” so far.
However, the authorities are observing an influx of people towards service stations, two thirds of which are requisitioned for emergency vehicles. According to them, “tensions are beginning to appear”. Tuesday midday, the mobile telephone network still remained unavailable at 80%.
The cyclone devastated the Indian Ocean territory on Saturday, where around a third of the population lives in precarious, totally destroyed housing.
Chido was probably favored by surface waters close to 30°C, which provides more energy for storms, a global warming phenomenon already observed elsewhere this fall.
The priority is to ensure the “vital needs” of residents in terms of water and food, insisted Mr. Retailleau.
“We are starting to run out of water. We have a few bottles left but there are almost no stocks in the stores,” worries Antoy Abdallah, 34, resident of Tsoundzou, to AFP.
“We risk a health crisis,” warned Ben Issa Ousseni, the president of the departmental council.
According to the Interior Ministry, 50% of running water will be restored within 48 hours.
On the archipelago, the first medical desert in France, the only hospital, badly damaged, is “gradually resuming its activity” and will be supported by a field hospital from Thursday, indicated Mr. Retailleau.
The situation of the healthcare system is “very degraded” in Mayotte, declared the Minister of Health, Geneviève Darrieussecq. On Monday, the first 25 patients “in urgent situations” were evacuated to Reunion.
Solidarity
Another priority for the authorities: sending tents and tarpaulins to restore habitats, completely destroyed or the roof torn off by wind gusts which reached more than 220 km/h.
According to the French Red Cross, 20 tonnes of material are being transported.
Faced with the emergency, new Prime Minister François Bayrou called for “national solidarity” Monday evening, from his municipal council in Pau, in the southwest of France. This trip provoked strong criticism, while a crisis unit was assembled in Paris. The President of the National Assembly Yaël Braun-Pivet said Tuesday that she would have “preferred that the Prime Minister took the plane to Mayotte”.
Mr. Retailleau, known for his right-wing positions, has already stressed that the Mayotte archipelago cannot be rebuilt “without addressing the migration issue”.
Nearly half the population is made up of immigrants from neighboring Comoros or other African countries, according to the National Institute of Statistics.
“We are completely cut off from the world. We don’t have access to any information,” laments Antoy Abdallah.
Rescuers are still looking for victims and expect to find many victims in the rubble of the very populated shanty towns, particularly in the heights of Mamoudzou, the capital having called on Monday its adult residents and in “good physical condition” to “reinforce the teams on the ground.
Calls for solidarity and minutes of silence have multiplied, including abroad, with the United States indicating that it is ready to “offer appropriate humanitarian aid”.
