Ile-Ife market burns down, affecting 17 shops

The largest market in Ile-Ife, Osun State, Oja Tuntun, was the scene of an early Saturday morning fire that destroyed products valued at millions of naira and damaged no fewer than seventeen shops.

Sunday Special discovered that this market had three fire occurrences between July 2019 and December 2020, resulting in the destruction of numerous shops and commodities.

In a conversation with our correspondent, Adekunle Ibrahim, the spokesperson for the Osun State Fire Service, stated that firefighters responded to a distress call around 12:30 am from a resident residing near the market, even though the cause of the most recent incident’s market fire was still unknown.

Ibrahim revealed that a building housing sixteen businesses and a container inside the market was affected by the blazing fire when firefighters arrived on the scene. He also mentioned that a team from the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, fire unit joined the Osun firefighters and stopped the fire from becoming worse.

“A fire incident at Olulere new market, Oja tuntun in Ile-Ife was reported to the Ile-Ife Zonal Fire Station at approximately 00:30 hours on Saturday, November 11, 2023,” he stated.

“Our soldiers encountered the fire well-alive and extinguished it with support from the OAU Fire Unit. Over N500 million worth of property was spared, but a block with 16 stores overall and one container meant that a total of 17 stores were impacted.

In a same spirit, Kehinde Adeleke, the public relations officer for the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps’ Osun Command, stated that while firefighters fought to stop the fire from spreading to other areas of the market, command personnel were on duty to prevent looting.