Regional News of Thursday, 26 February 2004

Source: GNA

NADMO assists Oforikrom fire victims with relief items

Kumasi, Feb 26, GNA- The National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO) of the Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly (KMA), has presented a variety of relief items worth about 4.5 million cedis to victims of fire disaster at Oforikrom in Kumasi.

The items included 25 foam mattresses, 11 blankets, rubber mats and buckets and 20 plastic plates.

The NADMO in collaboration with the KMA also secured two tents, which have been erected to provide temporary shelter for some of the displaced victims.

Fire recently gutted a 20-room compound house at Oforikrom, displacing the 97 tenants and destroyed property worth millions of cedis.

Even though the cause of the fire was yet to be established, it was suspected to be an electrical fault.

Mr Maxwell Kofi Jumah, the Metropolitan Chief Executive of Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly did the presentation and expressed his sympathies to the victims and advised landlords against engaging unqualified electricians to wire their houses.

He said they should always ensure that they made use of qualified electricians and also re-examine or replace the wiring system after every 10 years, as the law required.

The KMA Chief Executive said that even though the law required that re-examination of wiring system of houses should be done after 10 years, many landlords have deliberately ignored it, thus exposing such houses to risks of fire disasters.

Mr Gabriel Dwomoh, assemblyman for Oforikrom, asked the people to keep their environment clean and maintain personal hygiene at all times.

Mallam Osmanu Immam, spokesman for the victims who received the items, commended the NADMO and KMA for the assistance and appealed to benevolent organisations to also assist them with building materials for the rehabilitation of their houses.