Rain wreaks havoc at Swakopmund’s DRC settlement

UNUSUAL heavy rains flooded Swakopmund on Wednesday, with the DRC informal settlement being hit the hardest.

Residents of the informal settlement spent the day trying to safeguard their houses against the weather. However, many parts of the area have experienced flooding.

“The situation is very devastating,” Caroline Kasenda, a resident of the DRC says.

She explains that many children were unable to attend school on Wednesday as they needed to fix roofs and remove water from their homes, while others do not have dry clothes and are worried about traversing the flooded streets to reach school.

She is calling for better infrastructure to be implemented urgently: “I also asked neighbours how it is going with them and everybody is devastated at the current moment. It’s like it doesn’t matter how perfect, a shack is just a shack. It doesn’t matter how well it’s built or with what material it’s built with. So, we hope that infrastructure really turns to be taken care of this year. We hope the government turns to look after the people of DRC this year because as things are going, it’s not really good.”

Jacqueline !Gorases is the owner of Ubuntu Safe Haven Soup Litchen in the DRC and has been impacted by the heavy rainfall as well.

“When I went out, the people were on the roof, trying to fix the roof because it was leaking.
Most of the people in my area were on their roofs.”

As a soup kitchen owner, she currently caters to seven children in her house, all of whose beds are wet due to leakage from the roof.

She says the rain has caused severe stress for the residents.

“In my area, most of the people’s houses are leaking. Most of the people are angry.
We did not expect rain to fall this heavy because I think it’s been a while since we had this much rain at Swakop.”

She also raises concern over those residences that have electricity, worrying about water getting into the electrical boxes. Furthermore, the roads at Swakopmund have no drainage for water.

“There’s no safety measures for this water”, she explains.

Those who build shacks at the informal settlement are well versed in keeping out fog, but since rain is rare at the coast, the sails used to insulate their homes are insufficient for rain and often become torn with time.

In spite of this, she remains hopeful: “We are just praying for it to stop, for the sun. Because at the end of each rain, I know for a fact that it’s going to be really sunny. So we are just waiting for the sun to come out so that we can hang our wet mattresses and clothes.”

“But it’s beautiful though. At the end of the day, it’s beautiful,” !Gorases says.

In response to these challenges, the Swakopmund Municipality has pointed to their 2025 reflection on land and housing, and assured that measures to provide affordable homes are ongoing.