An early morning fire on Friday razed the Abdulkadir Kure Ultra Modern market in Minna, destroying about 70 shops and goods worth millions of Naira in its wake.
Daily Trust gathered that the fire started from a tea and noodles seller popularly called ‘Mai Shia’ whose extension shop is very close to the palm oil shops’ block at about 6 am.
Witnesses said the palm and ground nut oil seemed to have further fueled it, thereby destroying many shops before fire fighters arrived the scene and curtailed it.
It later reignited from one of the locked shops at about 11 am and spread to other sections of the market.
Although, the immediate cause of the fire incident was not known, witnesses said the tea seller may have left the stove on and went for an early morning prayers thereby, leaving the fire unattended to.
The Chairman of the Kure Market Traders Association, Alhaji Yusuf. who was also a victim, said he lost a complete truck of palm oil loaded of four hundred gallons worth N10,000 each which makes a total of N40,000,000.
He said until full assessment is carried out, it would be difficult to quantify the actual loss.
Another trader, Malam Alhassan Husseini, said that he had lost goods worth over N1 million and cash of over N300,000 to the fire incident.
Governor Abubakar Sani Bello, who visited the market, described the incident as sad and unfortunate.
Daily Trust reports that the fire outbreak in the Market seems to be a yearly occurrence having also happened in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 and February 2018.
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