Fire destroys property worth millions of naira in Ibadan

PROPERTY worth millions of naira were destroyed on Sunday evening when fire razed a two-storey business building, shops, printing press and carpenter’s shop, beside Total filling station, opposite UMC, Molete Ibadan.

The fire, according to eyewitnesses began from a carpenter’s shop behind the building which houses several care dealers’ offices, consulting firm and recording studios.

The carpenter’s workshop, said to have been built around 37 years ago, specifically in 1982, belonged to a sexagenarian, whom investigation revealed also resides in that shop.

Tribune Online gathered that the man, who is now said to be left only with a trouser of an ankara material was sleeping inside the shop when he was alerted of the fire incident.

An eye witness further informed that concerned neighbours put a call through to fire service station at Challenge but surprisingly, the station did not have water in its reservoir to attend to the emergency situation, same for another fire station at Aleshinloye market area.

Respite, however, came when a neighbour helped to contact a fire service station at the state secretariat, Agodi, Ibadan, after a popular FM radio station had announced the incident on air.

By the time the fire brigade arrived at the scene of the fire disater, the printing press with about four operating machines, carpenter’s workshop, among others had been completely razed by the inferno.

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When Tribune Online attempted to speak with the dejected carpenter, all he could utter was “just go away from me now. I can’t say anything.”

The man whose identity could not be ascertained at the time of filing this report sat helplessly on a wooden bench, a few meters away as people sympathise with him.

Several sympathisers assisted to drive out some cars parked at the premises of the building to avoid being burnt.