Mr Ibrahim Liman, the Controller General, Federal Fire Service, has pleaded with Kebbi government to acquire modern fire-fighting trucks for effective fire-fighting.
Liman made the call during the deployment of one modern fire-fighting truck to the state government on Thursday in Kebbi.
He said that the deployment of the truck was to complement the efforts of the state Fire Service in fire-fighting and related emergencies and to reduce the response time to fire incidents.
He also donated five Personal Protective Equipments worth more than N1 million alongside fire fighting trucks chemicals.
He called on the state government to purchase two new extra fire trucks with provision of chemical and foam compound for effective fire-fighting in the state.
Liman said that the allocation of two utility vehicles was paramount as one would enable the Federal Fire Service officers in the state to complement the state Fire Service.
“This will be used in the area of fire
risk assessment in public and private premises while the other one will be converted to Rapid Intervention Vehicle (RIV).
“They will complement equipment and gadgets for quick response in the event of emergencies,” he said.
He appealed to Kebbi government to enhance welfare package for fire personnel by implementing Para-Military Salary Structure for the benefit of fire fighters.
“Strengthen state fire service through recruitment of capable hands and rehabilitation, upgrade of fixed and mobile fire-fighting assets,” he pleaded with the government.
He also advised citizens to call on the federal or state fire service on time in cases of fire incidents.K
Gov. Abubakar Bagudu of Kebbi said that the state government would look into all requests made by Liman with the view of complementing the services of the fire service.
Bagudu, represented by Mr Suleiman Argungu, Chief of Staff in Kebbi, said that the deployment of the modern fire-fighting truck was prompt because of the harmattan season when fire outbreak could be rampant.
“With the new truck, we hope to attend to fire outbreaks on time to save lives and property.
“We will ensure our fire-fighters go on training and re-training on how to effectively attend to fire incidents.
“We will ensure that more modern fire trucks will be purchased to help fight fire outbreaks in all the local governments of the state.
“We will continue to enlighten our people royal fathers and local government council leaders who are present here to help to prevent or reduce fire incidents within the state considering the high fire incident recorded in 2020,” he said.
In his remarks, the state Commissioner for Works Abubakar Ladan, said that deployment of the new truck would ease the stress on the functional rucks in the state.
Ladan said that that in 2020, the state recorded 156 fire incidents report while in 2019, 157 fire incidents were recorded.
“In 2019 the state lost 11 lives to fire incidents while in 2020 only one life was lost,” he said.(NAN)
