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Senate decries incessant fire disasters in markets

By Segun Olaniyi, Abuja
14 April 2016   |   1:47 am
The Senate yesterday raised the alarm over incessant fire outbreaks in major markets across the country.

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‘Public procurement bill passes second reading’
The Senate yesterday raised the alarm over incessant fire outbreaks in major markets across the country.

It stated that traders across the country have lost over N5.3 trillion to fire disaster since 1999 to date, stressing that no fewer than 600 lives and goods worth trillions of naira have been lost to market fires in the country between 2010 and 2016.

Adopting the motion sponsored by Senator Rabiu Kwankwanso (APC, Kano Central) titled ‘Incessant Kano Markets’ Infernos of Sabon-Gari, Singer and Kwari, the Upper Chamber called on the states and local councils to constitute a special task force that would be saddled with the responsibility of investigating the incessant fire outbreaks in public places across the country.

It called on the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) in collaboration with National Orientation Agency (NOA) to embark on a national campaign on the need for the public to strictly adhere to national fire safety code in order to prevent the perennial occurrence of fire outbreaks.

The Senate urged the three tiers of government to provide their fire service departments with requisite state-of-the-art fire fighting equipment, introduce routine training and motivation strategies of the fire service members of staff so that they can respond more efficiently during fire outbreaks.

Kwankwanso noted that the rate at which these fire outbreaks occur is becoming worrisome and calls to question the effectiveness of our federal and state fire service and other emergency response management agencies tasked with the mandate of urgently addressing the trend of infernos, among others.

Meanwhile, a bill for an Act to amend the Public Procurement Act to provide for and adopt a Local Content Policy and timely completion of procurement processes has passed the second reading in Senate.

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