As El Niño Returns, East Africa’s Urban Poor Brace for Heavy Rains

Tanzania’s vice-president inspects a drainage channel in Dar es Salaam as authorities step up preparations for heavy El Niño rains expected during the October–December rainy season. Credit: Kizito Makoye/IPSby Kizito Makoye (dar es salaam, tanzania)Tuesday, October 20, 2026Inter Press Service DAR ES SALAAM, Tanzania, October 20 (IPS) - Nearly three decades have passed, but Japhet Gimbi still remembers the rain. He was a Form 2 student in Tabora, western Tanzania, when the 1997 El Niño flooded the town. As the rain kept falling, fewer students made it to school. That was a super El Niño, one of the strongest on record. Since then there have been five other events including the 2014-2016 “super El Niño”. “It just kept raining. Day after day, the rain wouldn’t stop,” Gimbi, who now lives in Dar es Salaam, recalled.But his strongest memory is of food running short at home.“We would only eat Ugali without vegetables,” he said.At Kwihara village, Hatibu Halfan remembers the same season differently. He was a 27-year-old farmer when the rains initially seemed a blessing. His rice crop flourished.Then the ground became waterlogged. Cassava and sweet potatoes rotted. Homes in low-lying areas...