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Kumasi markets burnt down…Central, Asafo markets destroyed

PThis year’s Easter Good Friday was not the best for many traders, mostly women, at the Kumasi Central Market as fire destroyed their wares running into hundreds of Ghana Cedis.

The fire destroyed the Subinso portion of the market where traders deal mostly in second hand clothes. 

It was an uneasy scene as most of the victims who thronged there could only watch their wares being destroyed by the ravaging fire, leaving some of them weeping and gnashing their teeth. 

According to eyewitnesses if the Ghana National Fire Service personnel had been called earlier the fire would not have escalated.

The Ghanaian Times counted four fire tenders that were used to put out the raging flames that were burning close to a fuel station.

Ashanti Regional Fire Service Commander, Joshua Nguah, said it would be difficult to estimate the cost of destruction, stressing, “I am sure if we had been called early enough the extent of damage would have been minimised.”

Although we were called late, “we thank God we have been able to put out the fire”, he said.

The Kumasi Metro Coordinator for the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO), Frank Duodu, who was at the scene at the fire incident, urged the public to adopt the habit of calling authorised firefighters quickly.

Member of Parliament (MP) for Manhyia South, Dr Matthew Opoku Prempeh, visited the scene to console the victims and assured them of financial support.

He told them soon the President would cut the sod for the reconstruction of the market which would go a long way to end such fire outbreaks.

In 2018, about 50 stalls at the same portion of the market were razed down by a similar fire incident.

Properties amounting to thousands of Ghana cedis were lost in that fire outbreak.

Corn mill machines, bags of beans, bags of pepper, rubbers, clothes, earrings, and others were burnt in that fire.

FROM KINGSLEY E. HOPE, KUMASI 

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