Yahoo TV

STORY: For Alagoa Morris, the trauma of repeated flooding is all too familiar.

He says his home and office in southern Nigeria's Bayelsa state gets hit by floods every rainy season.

The consequences: property loss and weeks of homelessness for his family.

"We suffered so much in terms of furniture damage, books got spoilt in the office, and then my wife also lost her birds that she was rearing, that were very healthy, over 100 broilers, all of them died."

Nigeria’s Hydrological Services Agency says Bayelsa and 10 other states are at risk of flooding.

There has been heavy rainfall in West and Central Africa.

Nigeria’s hydrological group said it was notified by authorities in Cameroon that they had started controlled water releases from Lagdo dam -- one of its largest.

Cameroon has several dams on the Benue River, which flows downstream to Nigeria.

The Nigerian side says dam managers in Cameroon plan to release water gradually to prevent flooding…

But it’s urging state and federal authorities to be prepared.

:: Unocha Nigeria

The country is already grappling with severe floods in the northeastern Borno state... after a dam's walls burst from heavy rains.

:: Press Unit, Ahoada West Lga, Rivers State

In 2022, more than 600 people died during Nigeria’s worst flooding in a decade.

There was heavy rain then, too.

Cameroon released water from the same dam.

At the time, experts said Nigeria's failure to complete a dam of its own -- that was supposed to backstop the Cameroonian one -- made the disaster worse.

Nigeria is prone to flooding but critics say defective infrastructure and poor planning add to the problem.

Morris works with the Environmental Defenders Network.

He says he wants the federal government to do more.

"I want the federal government to go beyond predictions of doom, they should proffer solutions, lasting solutions."