Ben Ezechime, Enugu
The senator representing Enugu North Senatorial District, Sen. Okey Ezea, has expressed sadness over the fire incident that gutted Afor Opi Market in Opi, Nsukka Local Government Area, Enugu State.
The inferno which was said to have been caused by a truck carrying inflammable products destroyed hundreds of shops and goods worth millions of Naira in the market. It was learned that the truck, while avoiding some bad spots on the road, unfortunately fell in front of the market and spilled its inflammable contents that thereafter ignited fire that wreaked the havoc.
Senator Ezea regrettably noted that the accident was avoidable and would indeed have been significantly avoided had the 9th-Mile-Obollo Afor-Makurdi Road, which hitherto provided veritable bypass to motorists commuting the Eastern Corridor, been motorable.
It would be recalled that Sen. Okey Ezea had recently called for the urgent repair of the 9th Mile-Obollo–Makurdi Road which is currently in a sorry state. According to Senator Ezea, the fallen truck would not have had any need to ply the Old Opi-9th Mile Road had the 9th Mile-Obollo Afor–Makurdi Expressway been in a state of repair. The Senator expressed regrets that the road has for years been abandoned by successive governments despite repeated appeals to the Federal Government for urgent intervention on the road.
While noting the untold hardships his constituents and other users of the road suffer on account of its impassable state, Senator Ezea appealed to the Federal Government for immediate repair and reconstruction of 9th Mile-Obollo-Afor-Makurdi Road to ease the sufferings of both commuters and motorists who ply the road.
In the same vein, the Senator also appealed to both the Federal and State emergency management agencies to quickly respond to the plight of the victims of the inferno through urgent deployment of relief materials as well as assistance in the rebuilding and reconstruction of the affected shops.
Senator Ezea enjoined the government, at both national and state levels, to show empathy by ensuring that adequate compensations are paid to the fire victims to assuage their losses in this critical period of national economic instability.
While thanking God for zero casualty recorded in the conflagration, Senator Ezea however sympathises with those who sustained various degrees of injury while trying to put out the raging fire.
