Kibera resident fears El Niño floods as Nairobi drainage remains a concern

Agnes Shikoli, 62, says she is afraid of what Kenya's short rainy season could bring to her home in Kibera, a neighbourhood of Nairobi. She lives a couple of metres from the Ngong river, and her fear follows warnings that El Niño, a climate pattern that forecasters say can bring extreme weather to many parts of the world, could bring new flooding. Speaking to the BBC, she said: "I feel like it can kill us. These houses aren't made of stone."

Her home is built of corrugated iron, and its six-foot (1.8m) wall reached halfway up with floodwater in March, she said. Her sister, Beatrice Khalayi, 58, died of electrocution after her house flooded in Kibera during intense rains earlier in the year. Shikoli said that houses like hers could fall, or that water could drown the people inside.

The floods were not confined to Nairobi. More than 60 people across Kenya lost their lives during the long rainy season earlier in the year. Forecasters have warned that this year could see one of the strongest El Niño events on record, with a threat of more intense than usual rains in southern Kenya.

The government's Climate Worx programme, which operates under the office of President William Ruto, is meant to rehabilitate Nairobi's rivers. Part of that work involves clearing garbage from riverbeds.

Bramwell Simiyu, the chief of Nairobi County's disaster management, told the BBC that the city's drainage systems have been "untouched for many years," and that removing rubbish from them will save lives. He said the existing drainage system was developed 30 years ago for about 2.5 million residents. The city now has an estimated 7 million people during the day and 5.5 million at night.

Simiyu put the cost of fully upgrading Nairobi's sewerage and drainage system at up to $192m (£143m).