• Second incident in six months
• Birnin Kebbi central market also gutted
Two major markets in the north –Abubakar Rimi Market, Kano and Birnin Kebbi Central market- were razed in separate incidents yesterday, leaving shop owners with losses running into billions of naira.
It was the second fire tragedy in three months at the Rimi market. The first one last December affected mainly the furniture section.
Yesterday’s was however, more widespread and devastating. No fewer than 6,000 shops including make shift stalls were wiped out by yesterday’s fire which raged for about 12 hours.
It also spread to the nearby branch of First Bank where documents were burnt.
It could not be immediately ascertained whether cash was affected.
Sources said the fire appeared to have resulted from an electric spark in a patent medicine store close to the Hamza Abdullahi gate of the market complex at about 12.25am yesterday, destroying goods and cash.
One of the shop owners, Ugochukwu Okorom, said: “When I heard about the fire, I rushed to the market because my house is very close. I got here at about 5 am and one of my neighbours called me on phone. The security guards told me that the fire started about 12: 25 am.
”However, I could not salvage anything. I am a medicine dealer. I lost over N20 million drugs.”
Fire fighters battled to put out the fire while the police, assisted by personnel of the Security and Civil Defence Corps and Hisbah cordoned off the area to prevent hoodlums from taking advantage of the chaotic situation to pilfer goods.
Mamud Sariki Yelwa, 22, a dealer in wrist watches blamed the market authorities for restoring electricity supply to the complex ”against our wish.”
He said: “We complained to them that we were not interested because in 2007, a similar incident happened.
“We told the market leadership that we preferred using our generators and at the close of business activities, we’ll switch them off.
“They went ahead to restore power supply which is hardly available during the day. They prefer to bring light at night when everyone has gone home.
“Some traders may forget to switch off their electrical appliances at the close of business and when there is a power surge there could be trouble as we’ve just witnessed. I lost all the goods in my three shops, including N2.5 million cash to the inferno.”
No life was lost neither was anyone injured.
But despite the heavy presence of security personnel at the market, hoodlums managed to steal goods by pretending to help traders salvage their goods.
Contacted, the managing director of the market, Alhaji Sani Abdullahi Mata, said the cause of the fire was yet to be established.
He said investigation into the cause was on-going and sympathised with traders who lost their goods in the inferno.
The Birnin Kebbi Central Market was similarly gutted early yesterday according to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN).
Properties worth millions of naira were destroyed but no life was lost.
Alhaji Abubakar Bandam, the chairman of the central market management, told newsmen in Birnin Kebbi that the fire was noticed at about 12:00 mid night.
But he said the cause was yet to be determined.
He said the management of the market was working closely with security agencies to identify the cause, just as he commended the state Department of Fire Service for its prompt response.
Alhaji Bello Zagga, the state Director of Fire Service, told NAN that the fire lasted for several hours because the firefighting vans did not have easy access to the spot of the inferno.
He said although the source of the fire was yet to be identified, suspected sources could be illegal electrical wiring and connections in shops.
NAN reports that officials from the state government led by the Chief of Staff of the government house, Alhaji Suleiman Argungu, and the Emir of Gwandu, Alhaji Mohammad Bashar, visited the scene to sympathise with traders who lost their goods.
