Awka Parents Keep Children Home as Heavy Rain Brings Back Flood Fears

(Flood Area. Photo by Daily Post)

Fear of a repeat tragedy kept many parents and guardians in Awka, the Anambra State capital, and nearby areas from sending their children to school on Tuesday.

A heavy downpour started around 4am and went on for hours.

The worry came exactly one week after six-year-old Success Ezenwafor, a pupil of Nnamdi Azikiwe University Primary School, was swept away by flood while on his way to school in a bus.

About eight other people were on the bus with him when the vehicle got trapped in the floodwaters.

Everyone else was rescued but Success was carried away.

His lifeless body was found the next day.

Parents still seem shaken by what happened, and many chose not to take any risk when fresh heavy rain fell on Awka and neighbouring communities on Tuesday.

The situation also led a journalist and public affairs commentator, Jude Atupulazi, to issue a warning.

He urged parents to put the safety of their children before school attendance.

Atupulazi recalled that at this same time last Tuesday, the boy was trapped in a flood in a bus with two of his siblings and others before he was finally swept away.

He noted that it is another Tuesday and it has been raining.

He asked parents to check their surroundings and the route their children use to get to school, and to let them stay home if it is not safe.

One parent who spoke to a news correspondent said the loss of Success is still too fresh to ignore.

The parent said nobody should blame a parent for keeping a child at home in this kind of rain.

Another parent said a child can make up for a missed school day, but a child lost to flooding can never be replaced.