Mayotte authorities fear hunger and disease after cyclone; death toll rises in Mozambique

PARIS – The authorities in Mayotte were racing on Dec 17 to stop hunger, disease and lawlessness from spreading in the French overseas territory after the weekend’s devastating cyclone, while Mozambique reported dozens of deaths from the storm.

Hundreds, or even thousands, could be dead

in Mayotte, which took the strongest hit from Cyclone Chido, French officials have said. 

The storm laid waste to large parts of the archipelago, off east Africa, France’s poorest overseas territory, before striking continental Africa.

With many parts of Mayotte still inaccessible and some victims buried before their deaths could be officially counted, it may take days to discover the full extent of the destruction.

So far, 22 deaths and more than 1,400 injuries have been confirmed, Mr Ambdilwahedou Soumaila, mayor of the capital Mamoudzou, told Radio France Internationale on the morning of Dec 17.

“The priority today is water and food,” Mr Soumaila said. “There are people who have unfortunately died where the bodies are starting to decompose that can create a sanitary problem.”

“We don’t have electricity. When night falls, there are people who take advantage of that situation,” he added.

Twenty tonnes of food and water were due to start arriving on Dec 17 by air and sea. The French government said late on Dec 16 it expects 50 per cent of water supplies to be restored within 48 hours and 95 per cent within the week.

France’s Interior Ministry announced that a curfew would go into effect on the evening of Dec 17 from 10pm to 4am.

Rescue workers have been searching for survivors amid the debris of shanty towns that were bowled over by 200kmh winds.

Chido was the strongest storm to strike Mayotte in more than 90 years, French weather service Meteo France said. In Mozambique, it killed at least 34 people, officials said on Dec 17. Another seven died in Malawi.

Drone footage from Mozambique’s Cabo Delgado province, already experiencing a humanitarian crisis due to an Islamist insurgency, showed razed thatched-roof houses near the beach and personal belongings scattered under the few palm trees still standing.

Illegal immigration

French President Emmanuel Macron said after an emergency Cabinet meeting on Dec 16 that he would visit Mayotte in the “coming days”, as the disaster quickly fuelled a political back-and-forth about immigration, the environment and France’s treatment of its overseas territories.

Mayotte has been grappling with unrest in recent years, with many residents angry at illegal immigration and inflation.

More than three-quarters of its roughly 321,000 people live in relative poverty, and about one-third are estimated to be undocumented migrants, most from nearby Comoros and Madagascar.

The territory has become a stronghold for the far-right National Rally, with 60 per cent voting for Ms Marine Le Pen in the 2022 presidential election run-off.

France’s acting Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau, from the conservative Republicans party, told a news conference in Mayotte that the early warning system worked “perfectly”, but that many of the undocumented did not go to designated shelters.

Other officials have said undocumented migrants may have been afraid to go to shelters for fear of being arrested.

The toll of the cyclone, Mr Retailleau said in a subsequent post on X, underscored the need to address “the migration question”.

“Mayotte is the symbol of the drift that governments have allowed to take hold on this issue,” he said. “We will need to legislate so that in Mayotte, like everywhere else on the national territory, France retakes control of its immigration.”

Left-wing politicians, however, have pointed the finger at what they say is the government’s neglect of Mayotte and failure to prepare for natural disasters linked to climate change.

“A cyclone, fuelled by climate change, struck an abandoned French territory. Hundreds, even thousands of deaths, are expected. And you write that Mayotte’s problem is... immigration. Disgusting,” Ms Melanie Vogel, a senator from the Europe Ecology party, wrote in response to Mr Retailleau’s X post.

Prime Minister Francois Bayrou, appointed last week to steer France out of a political crisis, faced criticism after he went to the town of Pau, where he is the mayor, to attend a municipal council meeting on Dec 17, instead of visiting Mayotte. REUTERS