French President Emmanuel Macron tours the hurricane-stricken island of Mayotte, meets with survivors and asks for help

Mamoudzou, Mayotte On Thursday, French President Emmanuel Macron went to the Mayotte Archipelago in the Indian Ocean to conduct a survey Devastation caused by Typhoon Chido Across French territory, thousands of people tried to adapt without access to basic necessities like water or electricity.

An airport security officer told Macron immediately after getting off the plane: “Mayotte has been demolished.”

Security agent Assan Haloy said her family members, including young children, are without water or electricity and have nowhere to go after the strongest hurricane in nearly a century that struck the French territory of Mayotte off the coast of Africa on Saturday.

She said: “There is no roof, there is nothing. No water, no food, no electricity. We can’t even take shelter, we are all wet and our children cover ourselves with everything we have so we can sleep.” Helps.

Macron took a helicopter tour to survey the damage and was scheduled to spend Thursday night in the remote French territory. After flying over the devastation, he headed to Mamoudzou Hospital, the capital of Mayotte, to meet medical staff and patients.

The French president, wearing a traditional Mayotte scarf over his white shirt, tie and sleeves reaching the elbows, listened to people calling for help. A medical staff member told him that some people had not drunk water for 48 hours.

Some residents also expressed their anguish at not knowing who died or was still missing, partly due to the Islamic practice of burying the dead within 24 hours.

“We are dealing with open-air mass graves,” Estelle Youssoufa, MP for Mayotte, told reporters. “There are no rescuers, and no one came to retrieve the buried bodies.”

Some survivors and relief organizations described hasty burials and the foul smell of the bodies.

Macron admitted that many deaths had not been reported. He added that phone services would be fixed “in the coming days” so people could report missing loved ones.

French authorities said that at least 31 people were killed and more than 1,500 people were injured, more than 200 of whom were in serious condition. But it is feared that hundreds or even thousands of people may have died overall.

Abdo Hamadou, 27, said emergency aid was needed immediately, not Macron’s presence.

“Mr. President, what I would like to say to you… is that I believe that the spending I spent from Paris to Mayotte could have been better spent helping people,” he said.

Another resident, Ahmadi Mohamed, said Macron’s visit “is a good thing because he will be able to see the damage for himself.”

“I think we will then get significant aid to try to get the island back on its feet,” the 58-year-old said.

Macron’s office said four tons of food and medical aid, as well as additional rescuers, were on the president’s flight. A navy ship is scheduled to arrive in Mayotte on Thursday carrying another 180 tons of aid and equipment, according to the French military.

People living in a large slum on the outskirts of Mamoudzou were among those hardest hit by the cyclone. Many have lost their homes, some have lost friends.

Nasiru Hamidouni was taking shelter in his home when the tornado struck.

His neighbor was killed when his house collapsed on him and his six children. Hamidouni and others dug through the rubble to reach them.

The 28-year-old father of five is now trying to rebuild his home, which was also destroyed.

The death toll is believed to be much higher than officially reported, given the severity of what he experienced.

“It was very difficult,” he said.

The island of Mayotte is located in the Indian Ocean between the eastern coast of Africa and northern Madagascar, and is the poorest region in France.

The hurricane destroyed entire neighborhoods and many people ignored the warnings, thinking that the storm would not be very severe.

The population of Mayotte is more than 320,000 according to the French government. Most of them are Muslims, and the French authorities estimated that there were another 100,000 immigrants living there.

Mayotte is the only part of the Comoros archipelago that voted to remain part of France in a 1974 referendum.

Over the past decade, French territory has witnessed a massive influx of migrants from neighboring islands – the independent state of the Comoros, which is one of the poorest countries in the world.