Lagos State Governor, Babatunde Fashola visited the burnt Balogun Market, Lagos on Tuesday to get first hand assessment of the burnt section of the market, pledging to help rebuild the market.
The governor, who addressed thousands of onlookers also pledged to give succour to traders who lost their wares in the fire disaster, which burnt four high rising buildings in the market on Monday.
The governor described the incident as sad, but assured that government would stand by the traders and help them to get back to their businesses, urging market leaders to help government identify those who owned wares in the market to enable government assist them.
“We want to know what the estimate of losses are. You have to liaise with the market leaders. We will help you. This will also apply to all the plazas affected. It is impossible for us to count the number of people while we are here.
“The Commissioner for Special Duties is here, he will liaise with all the people and the plazas affected to have a clear view of the type of businesses they do and the estimate and we assure you that we will help you,” he said.
The governor said with what he had gathered so far, the fire might have resulted from an electrical surge, appealing to the people to beware of illegal connections, especially at this period of dry season and harmattan.
“I know there is problem with electricity, but we must be careful how we use the alternatives available to us like generators and illegal connections in order to avoid risk. I appeal to Lagosians because of the dry season we are in as there is the risk of fire. You have to stop storing inflammable materials in your homes and plazas and switch of any appliances not in use.
“Harmattan is here, just yesterday (Monday), we responded to 18 fire situations in Lagos. In November, we bought 32 fire engines, part of which were used here, we don’t want to be putting out fire, we want to prevent fire from happening. You have to be safety conscious,” he said.
Fashola also appealed to traders and marketers to insure their businesses for safety purposes so that when they run into problems, the insurance company can come to their aid, saying that the premium charged by these insurance companies was not much and affordable.
“I appeal to all of you who do businesses to take up insurance for your businesses. The premium charged is not much, insurance company will have come to your aid at this period. Market men and women should sit down and adopt a policy for the future. The insurance companies also must raise their own game,” stated.
Earlier, Director, Lagos State Fire Services, Rasak Fadipe said the fire affected four buildings, saying that the inferno was fuelled due to large number of illegal structures surrounding the high rising buildings.
He said several fire trucks were mobilised to the scene to quell the raging fire but that the large crowd present at the scene slowed the operation of the fire fighters, adding that, the fire was initially put out on Monday evening, but that at midnight, there was another explosion which ignited the fire again, but that it had now been put under control.
According to him, some power distribution company officials came to work on three transformers in the area on Monday night and one of them exploded and ignited the fire again, “but it has now been put under control. What you have now is just smoke.”
