Over the last few days the government has scaled up its disaster preparedness, with the setting up of a multi-institutional national steering committee designed to shore up other existing strategies. The move came at a time various parts of the country were experiencing torrential rains which have claimed the lives of at least 17 people and destroyed property.The committee is meant to compliment and coordinate existing mitigation efforts and ensure that the situation is managed in an appropriate manner.At the same time the government distributed mobile phones to local leaders in some of the most disaster-prone regions, to help ensure that information about looming disasters gets to the relevant authorities on time. Indeed timely communication would boost chances to adequately deal with disasters, or at least mitigating their effects when they strike.However, it is more important that Rwandans embrace long-term mitigation measures, including terracing and planting trees on bare hills to lessen the scale and impact of floods. Also, families which are resident in wetlands or other uninhabitable areas should be relocated to minimise possibilities of loss of lives in the wake of disasters.Above all, local leaders and the general public need to cooperate and own these measures if they are to bear fruits.
