Mayotte battles hunger and health crisis post-cyclone; death toll rises in Mozambique

Authorities in Mayotte were racing on Tuesday 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.

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

“The priority today is water and food,” 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.”

Twenty tonnes of food and water are due to start arriving on Tuesday by air and sea. The French government said late on Monday it expects 50% of water supplies to be restored within 48 hours and 95% within the week.

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France’s interior ministry announced that a curfew would go into effect on Tuesday night from 10 pm to 4 am local time.

Rescue workers have been searching for survivors amid the debris of shantytowns bowled over by 200 kph (124 mph) 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 Tuesday. 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 Monday 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% voting for Marine Le Pen in the 2022 presidential election runoff.

France’s acting Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau, from the conservative Republicans party, told a news conference in Mayotte that the early warning system had worked “perfectly” but many of the undocumented had not come 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, Retailleau said in a later post on X, underscored the need to address “the migration question”.

“Mayotte is the symbol of the drift that (French) 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.

Socialist Party chairman Olivier Faure blasted Retailleau’s comments in an X post.

“He could have interrogated the role of climate change in producing more and more intense climate disasters. He could have rallied against the extreme poverty that makes people more vulnerable to cyclones,” said Faure.

“No, he has resumed his crusade against migrants.”

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 Monday, instead of visiting Mayotte.