Abakaliki, – The Ebonyi State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) on Tuesday in Abakaliki said it has recorded 50 emergency cases of fire disaster in recent times but has not responded with relief materials.
Mr Ken Ozioma, Secretary SEMA, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abakaliki that the economic meltdown was really affecting the rate of response to disaster by the government.
Ozioma said though government was not responding to every disaster at a time but extra efforts would be made to attend to as many as possible.
He warned residents of the state to adhere to advice given by SEMA during public awareness campaigns so as to reduce disasters.
Ozioma said that the Agency had been assisted by the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) with assorted relief materials and by other donor agencies in the past.
“If the state government is to respond to all disasters adequately, it will affect government in other areas and its economy, which is why we need more donor agencies to assist.
“We have 50 fire disaster cases on our table, assessed but not responded with relief materials because of the economic meltdown affecting the state.
[pro_ad_display_adzone id=”70560″]
“We are working with World Bank State Project (WBSP) for support and SEMA will strengthen synergy with other donor agencies such as Nigeria Port Authority, UNICEF among others for support,” he said.
Ozioma said the WBSP would help the agency with ambulance to attend to emergency cases and vehicles to move staff equipment to accident scenes while the ministry of works would provide crane.
“We have been on sensitisation of the public through different mediums.
“However, more efforts will be made to sensitise the stakeholders, who will reach out to people at the grassroots because the number of fire disasters in the state is disturbing,” Ozioma said. (NAN)
