Lake Naivasha floods displace 7,000 in Kenya’s rift valley

Tourist boats on Kenya’s Lake Naivasha have been repurposed to evacuate residents after rising waters submerged parts of the Kihoto district in Naivasha. The lake, which has been rising for more than a decade and repeatedly breaching its banks, has advanced up to 1.5 kilometers inland, a distance local officials described as unprecedented. Residents reported waist-deep water in homes and overflowing toilets, while a sudden rush of water forced children to leave school on makeshift rafts. Hundreds of homes are completely submerged, with churches in ruins and police stations underwater amid floating vegetation.

Joyce Cheche, head of disaster risk management for Nakuru County, estimated that 7,000 people have been displaced. She said the county has assisted with transporting affected residents and implemented health measures, but there has been no financial compensation so far. The flooding has affected wildlife and threatens tourism and other businesses. Workers in the flower sector, a major exporter, are refusing to report to work due to fears of cholera and landslides. Cheche also noted the risk of dangerous encounters with hippos, which are numerous in the lake, and said, “We didn’t see it coming.”

Along the shoreline, bare trunks of formerly verdant acacia trees are submerged as the water continues to spread at around a meter per day. Similar flooding has been observed in other Rift Valley lakes, displacing hundreds of thousands of people. Numerous studies attribute the phenomenon primarily to increased rainfall linked to climate change. Kenyan geologist John Lagat, regional manager at the state-owned Geothermal Development Corporation, said the main cause is tectonic activity along a long geological fault. He noted that the lake was larger at the end of the 19th century before shifting plates reduced its size to about one kilometer in diameter by 1921. He added that further tectonic changes increasingly sealed underground outflows, trapping water, while increased rainfall and land degradation driven by population growth are also playing a “substantial” role.