A furniture market along the Mile axis of Ikwerre road in Obio/Akpor local government area of Rivers State has been gutted by fire with goods worth millions of naira destroyed.
The PUNCH reports that the fire was ignited by a power generating set from a nearby welder working near one of the shops filled with foam (mattress) where the generator was kept.
Reports revealed that the fire started when the owner of the generator tried to put it on.
A number of furniture shops housing goods worth over N50 million were reportedly affected by the inferno as come traders attributed the cause of the incident to disregard for safety precautions.
“The welder did not even tell them to remove their foam, because foam is like fuel. As they were welding, it caused fire. The man (welder) ran with his machine.
“Look at my brother’s shop, and he is planning for his wedding on the 28th of this month. He just came from the village to make arrangements for the wedding,” one of the traders stated.
Another victim said, “The whole shop, nobody could bring out anything because the fire was very serious. It is close to 20 shops that got burnt here.”
A number of volunteers who rushed to douse the fire also criticised the state firefighters for failing to show up on time.
A resident who gave his name as Emeka said,” You can see more than 18 shops were on fire. We fetched water from the neighbouring tap to help. Even when we went to a school to get water, they refused.
“The fire was serious. I don’t see the reason why we will be in Port Harcourt and we will not see fire service to help in times like this,” he wondered
The Chairman of Obio/Akpor Local Government Area, George Ariolu who visited the scene of the fire and advised residents and business owners to have extinguishers.
“From the on-the-spot assessment, we hear that somebody was trying to put on a generator and it spaced off. Like they say, accidents don’t just occur, they are caused. It depends on us individuals handling materials that can easily ignite fire to handle with care. That is what is important.
“If you ask me, for this fire to have gone this way, maybe they were putting on the generator inside the house that is loaded with foam, which is not supposed to be so. Imagine the level of damage,” the council chairman stated.
