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9 year old boy/Father of nine kids mourn as fire razed down Storey Building in Ebonyi…victims recount ordeal

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By Clement Nnachi (abakaliki)
Tragedy struck last Friday when fire gutted a One-Storey Building  located at No 28 Udensi Street abakaliki Ebonyi State, destroying properties worth millions of naira.
Investigations revealed that the First Floor of the building housing  three Flats were  all razed down in the inferno.
It was gathered that the inferno started from a section of the building before engulfing the entire block,
Although the cause of the fire disaster remain unknown as at the time of filing the report, but victims and other sympathizers blame the inferno on Power Surge from the Enugu Electricity Distribution Company (EEDC).
Narrating his ordeal before newsmen, a victim and tenant  of the building Mr Okoro Nkpuma, an indigen of Ohaozara Local Government (who works at Ebonyi State College of Education Ikwo, lamented that all his valuables, properties and undisclosed amount of money had been destroyed by the inferno.
“On my way they were calling me that fire has gutted my residence, none of my family members were at home,
” Reaching the compound, every place has gone down, there is no where we can sleep, we  the three occupants upstairs,
According to him, “every thing I laboured for has been destroyed, I could not rescue anything, all the documents, properties  gone”
“You can access the level of damage by yourself, the problem now us that my wife left an undisclosed amount of cash in the house, which has been burnt”
We the victims are appealing to the State government to come to our aid and assist us.
“If there is any help we can get from the government, we will appreciate, all my children are students”
In an interview, another victim (a nine year old boy and primary six pupil) identified as Master Ojemba Chidubem, narrated that he was sleeping in the room when the fire started.
“My aunty woked me up and dragged me out of the room when she notified I was sleeping inside,
Contributing, the State  Chief Fire Officer Engr Cele Nwakelebia, cautioned residents of the State to exhibit caution in the use of cooking and electrical appliances.
According to him, ‘we received a distress call  of fire incident in this Storey building very late, we have succeeded in putting off the fire,
” We deployed different team’s from our office, the three Fire Engineers are here, if not the quick response, they called us very late”
“You can see people bringing out their properties, from the inferno, we have not been able to identify the cause of the fire for now, we still interrogate the occupants”
Another victim of the fire disaster, Lady Ijeoma Jenet Nworie, (a teacher) who resides in the building with nine of her siblings, recounted that she came back from duty, she heard shouts from neighbours that their building was on fire.
She blamed the collossal damage of the inferno to negligence on the part of officials from the State Fire Service”
“When the fire fighters came, the fire was still minimal, but they were not prepared and equipped to combat the inferno head-long”
“I ran inside and beckoned on  my brother who was sleeping and I called my aunty to notify her of the ugly scenario, we ran outside and shouted for help”
“The Fire Service just came with one vehicle, with shortage of water, which finished early enough, before they could reorganized themselves, the whole structure has gone down””
In the same vein, another victim Hon Alieke Sampson, (a Public Servant), regretted  that he did not remove anything from his apartment.
“Both Documents, properties, Cushions, everything was destroyed, only that no life was lost”
He blamed Power surge from Distribution Company stating “when they bring light, they take it, when they later brought the light, it seems there was a spark.
” Government should help us, we are totally stranded, hopeless” the victims reiterated.

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