Suspected hoodlums Thursday attacked officials of the Federal Fire Service that responded to a fire call at Ojoto market, Mile 2 Diobu Port Harcourt, Port Harcourt City Local Government Area of Rivers State.
Disclosing this to newsmen while speaking on the incident,the chairman of the market, Arinze Akupue, maintained that the firemen were attacked by the hoodlums, to pave way for them to loot the goods in the market.
“Already we had a lot of hoodlums looting. They started throwing bottles on the vehicle of the fire service, trying to mob them”, the chairman disclosed.
He said it took intervention of officers from the Azikiwe Divisional Police Headquarters to rescue the firefighters.
Akupue explained that he went to the state fire service for assistance, but was referred to the Federal Fire Service.
“I drove down from my house to the park, where we have the Rivers state fire service. They told me they cannot do anything. In fact they were the people that directed me to Federal Fire Service, I was so disappointed that they could not respond.
“So, I drove immediately from there to Federal Secretariat where they gave me attention. I must commend them for that. I begged them that the market was going down. By then, the market was already 65% down.
“Immediately, they called their boss, the man was kind enough to approve and told them to follow us.
“As I was going back, I called the DPO of Illuabuchi Divisional Police Station and he responded also, because the fire servicemen needed security.
“The mob action was much. Immediately the fire men drove to the Illuabuchi Division Police Headquarters for their safety”, he said.
Speaking further, he denied media report that the fire was caused by someone cooking in the market.
”The cause of the fire has nothing to do with somebody cooking. The market was already shut down, all the traders had gone home.The market burnt down and nothing was removed from the market.
“The security man just called me that he’s seeing flames of fire in the market. And I asked him which of the area, he told me. Immediately I started calling persons around. This thing happened in a few minutes. He called me back that the market is going down”.
Metronetworknews reports that the fire, which started at about 10pm on Thursday night, razed down over 200 shops and properties worth millions of naira.
