Senate President Ahmad Lawan on Thursday visited the Central Market in Nguru, Yobe State to sympathise with the victims of the fire incident of last Saturday.
Lawan arrived Nguru in the afternoon, paid homage to the Emir of Nguru and later proceeded to the main market to see for himself what happened.
The Senate President later donated the sum of N10 million towards rebuilding the market and appealed to other people in the community to make similar contributions to ease the sufferings of those who are affected by the fire incident.
Lawan also witnessed the flag off of relief materials to victims’ by the Federal Ministry of Humaniterial Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development through the National Emergency Management Agency(NEMA).
A statement by Lawan’s spokesperson Ola Awoniyi said shortly before the distribution of relief materials, Lawan prayed against a recurrence of such incident.
He said: “Incident like this happen because they are destined to happen. But like some said, there are causes and sources of such accident. We need to look at why the fire outbreak is happening almost on yearly basis in our market here.
“Nguru Central Market is a very important market to us in Yobe State and in the Northeast. We have so many people who benefit from this market directly and indirectly.
“So we are supposed to do everything and anything possible within our limit to support our people who have lost so much in their businesses to the fire accident,” he said.
The Minister of Humanitarian Affair and Disaster Management and Social Development, Sadiya Umar Farouq said in a speech read on her behalf by her Director of Humanitarian Affairs, Grema Ali Alhaji said it was a sad incident “because of the extent of damage caused and losses to livelihoods of many persons.”
She said the relief materials brought were based on the damage assessment and need analysis conducted by NEMA and for emergency response.
The minister said the North East Development Commission(NEDC) had been directed to assess the situation for assistance of victims’ recovery from the disaster.
