João Lourenço announced the progress of the four projects, of which only one was started, after a meeting with the government of Cunene, a southern province heavily hit by drought, where the difficult social and economic situation in the region was presented.
The head of the executive, who began the second visit of his mandate to that province this Friday, stressed that, despite the deficiencies in areas such as health or education, the worst problem is the drought that, in a cyclical way, affects the province. and, in general, the south of Angola (provinces of Cuando Cubango, Cunene, Namibe and Huíla).
The President stressed that the drought affects people and animals, who face risk to their lives, but the solution is not to transport water in drums or food in trucks, as it will never be enough.
"The important thing is to guarantee the existence of water all year round", he stressed, noting that after the visit two years ago, the executive conceived three structural projects, of which only one (Cafu) made progress, due to the lack of financial resources, now surpassed .
According to João Lourenço, the construction of two other projects (the Calacuve and Ndué dam and canal) will start in the fourth quarter of this year.
"From October we guarantee that the machines will be on the ground to start these two projects", he stressed.
During the same period, the recovery of dikes and weirs in the Curoca region will also begin, with the rehabilitation of dams and hydraulic transfer works being planned for next year.
With the projects underway, João Lourenço believes that the "suffering" of populations and animals and the "very negative" scenario will change radically from 2023.
The governor of Cunene, Gerdina Didalelwa, took stock of the effects of the drought that currently affects 514,800 people and this year has translated into a "phenomenon of a lot of movement that has never happened" before.
Normally, according to the governor, people are assisted in their homes, but there are now around 4.00 displaced people in centers spread across all the provinces' municipalities.
In addition, more than 2000 people have fled to neighboring Namibia, most of them children between 5 and 10 years old.
So far 83,416 people have benefited, with support received from the central administration (615 tonnes of various products, especially food), the provincial government (326 tonnes of food) and social partners (196 tonnes of miscellaneous goods).
