Not less than 6,700 traders lost their goods to a fire that devastated the popular Mandilas building on Broad Street, in the Lagos Island on Sunday, January 21.
This is as 450 shops, 30 offices, two hotels, and five restaurants are reported by the Iya Oja of the Atunwase International Market Mandilas General, Alhaja Adeniji Rashidat, to have been destroyed by the impact of the fire which affected the 14-storey building.
The Lagos State Coordinator of the National Emergency Management Agency, –NEMA, Ibrahim Farinloye, revealed this in a statement on Monday.
Only yesterday, Monday, January 22, the Lagos State Fire and Rescue Service revealed that a careless welding during the installation of a power generator on the second floor of the Mandilas building in Lagos State led to the fire accident.
The fire allegedly began from the first floor of the building and spread to the seventh floor.
The Mandilas fire had also, spread to surrounding market stalls at the Atunwase International Market and those stalls gad been equally extensively damaged as the main complex.
Upon observing the scene of the unfortunate accident, some of the traders bemoaned the huge losses they incurred from the fire incident.
Officials from the Lagos Fire Service, Police, Lagos State Building Control Agency, and Lagos Neighbourhood Safety Corps were seen at the scene of the incident trying to control the situation and movement around the building.
