Huge losses suffered as fire razes Ibadan auto parts market

About 25 shops were torched as fire razed popular Araromi auto parts market at Agodi Gate of Ibadan, Oyo State, in the early hours of Saturday.

According to an eyewitness, Mr Ismail Dauda, the fire started from the tyre section before  spreading to other parts of the market, especially the car engine section and other shops, with goods worth millions of naira destroyed.

“The team of fire fighters that came to the market parked their trucks at the nearest place to the scene, but they could not really do anything tangible to stop the fire due to lack of access and their water hoses could not get to the scene,” he said.

General Manager Oyo State Fire Service, Rev. Canon Yemi Akinyinka, confirmed the incident in a telephone interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Saturday in Ibadan.

Akinyinka said the service got a call about the incident around 2.30 a.m. through one Mr Soliu and immediately deployed personnel to the place to quench the fire.

“The incident was caused by a careless burning of refuse, they refuse to put off the burning refuse before leaving the shop and it escalated.

“The impression they gave us initially was that around 45 shops were affected but when we got there we discovered that 25 shops were affected by the fire incident,” Akinyinka said.

He further said that his men were able to extinguish the fire around 5.00 a.m. on Saturday and no life was lost in the incident.