95% of educational institutions destroyed in Libya flood zone: Tripoli govt

Libya’s unity government has said that 95 percent of the educational institutions in the eastern part of the country were damaged by the tsunami-sized flash floods that killed thousands of people last week.

The statement was made at a joint press conference in Tripoli by Minister of Education Musa al Maqrif, who is also part of the government’s emergency and rapid response team, along with other officials.

He said, however, that t he school year will start next week across Libya.

"17 education facilities in Benghazi city have registered displaced students from the devastated areas," al Maqrif said on Monday.

At the same press conference, Ali al Quweirah, an official in the Education Ministry, noted that 114 schools in 15 localities were damaged by the floods.

He added that technical teams are evaluating and assessing the costs for the maintenance work in the schools.

Earlier, the Tripoli-based government said that 70 percent of the infrastructure in eastern Libya was damaged by last week’s devastating floods.

According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), at least 3,958 people have died across Libya due to flooding, revising its previous death toll of 11,300.

The full scale of the death toll has yet to emerge, with thousands of people still missing. Officials have given widely varying death tolls.

On Saturday, the head of Libya's eastern government, Osama Hamad, said that 3,252 corpses had been buried so far.

More than 40,000 people have been displaced across Libya’s northeastern areas by the deadly floods, said the UN office.

Mounting anger

Hundreds of people protested in the worst-hit city of Derna, venting anger against authorities and demanding accountability one week after a flood killed thousands of its residents and destroyed entire neighbourhoods.

Protesters took aim at officials, including the head of the eastern-based Libyan parliament, Aguila Saleh, during the demonstration outside the Sahaba Mosque. Some sat on the roof in front of its golden dome, a Derna landmark.

Later in the evening, angry protesters set fire to the house of the man who was Derna mayor at the time of the flood, Abdulmenam al Ghaithi, his office manager told Reuters.

Hichem Abu Chkiouat, a minister in the eastern-based Libyan government, said Ghaithi had been suspended from his post.

Monday's protest marked the first large demonstration since the flood, which swept through Derna when two dams in the hills outside the city failed during a powerful storm, unleashing a devastating torrent.

Derna is located in eastern Libya, a part of the country controlled by strongman Khalifa Haftar and overseen by a government established in parallel to the internationally-recognised administration in Tripoli, in the west.