Fire razes three-storey market building in Adum - Govt assures victims of support

Fire ravaged a three-storey commercial building at Adum in Kumasi, Friday morning, destroying several shops and causing panic among traders in the area.

The blaze started at the Blue Light Arena in the Railways area, around 6 a.m. and spread rapidly before fire officers arrived to contain it.

There was chaos at the scene of the calamity as shop owners frantically broke into their stores to salvage goods before the flames could consume them.

Most of the affected shops deal in mobile phones, accessories, jewellery and clothing.

Within hours, hundreds of spectators gathered at the scene to catch a glimpse of the raging fire which consumed wares worth thousands of Ghana cedis, as the shopowners and traders looked on helplessly.

Presdent commiserates

President John Mahama, who was on his way to the Northern Region, and had stopped over to launch the Tree for Life Restoration initiative, visited Adum to commiserate with those whose items were destroyed in the fire outbreak, and assured them of the government’s support to enable them to restart their businesses.

The market during the fire incident

He said the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO) had been instructed to take stock of the incident and provide some support to the victims in the interim.

Moreover, he said the Chief of Staff would also work with the Ashanti Regional Minister to assess the kind of support to give you so that you can have some comfort”.

Stop over

President Mahama said there was the need to take a cue from lessons of the fire outbreak in order to plan markets in the country very well with the necessary measures so as to prevent such incidents from happening again.

This was because his preliminary briefing indicated that the Ghana National Fire Service was facing a daunting task putting out the fire because of the poor access to the place.

Danger

As the President spoke, there were some explosions from liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) cylinders, and he advised that there was no need to use such equipment in markets.

He said cooking in markets was unacceptable and that through the use of gas cookers such fires occurred.

The President, who described the incident as sad, empathised with the victims of the disaster and emphasised that the government would not abandon them but see how it could support them.

“We don’t have to cook in markets, if you want to eat you must go outside, buy the food and come back,” he said.