No fewer than 700 shelters were destroyed by fire in an Internally Displaced Persons camp at Mafa Local Government Area of Borno State. The Secretary of the Council, Mohammed Lawan-Sheriff, made the disclosure in an interview with News Agency of Nigeria on Tuesday in Maiduguri.
Lawan-Sheriff said that dozens of households in the camp were displaced during the fire outbreak, which started about 11a.m. on Tuesday and lasted several hours. He said the fire incident, which began from a tent, gutted other shelters because there was no immediate fire service response in the camp as of the time of the incident.
He said the combined efforts of the IDPs, Civilian Joint Task Force, security agencies and other Good Samaritans brought the situation under control. “Immediately, we heard about the incident, we quickly mobilised the host community and rushed to the scene to put out the fire. So far, no death was recorded,” he said.