The Federal Fire Service (FFS) said 12 of the fire fighting truck ordered for have arrived the country even as its leadership is planning to extend its operations to all the state nationwide.
Speaking with Blueprint in an interview, the Controller General of FFS, Dr. Liman Alhaji Ibrahim, also revealed that before the end of year 2020 his agency will order for more 23 fire fighting trucks.
Liman, who was just a year in office as the FFS boss, expressed satisfaction at the level of attention the current administration has given to his agency.
When asked on what the country could do to stop the billions of naira losing to fire disaster anually, Liman said: “With this step the government has taken, we are already addressing it. The truth is that the public has lost confidence in the fire service before 2015. The situation was so bad that if there was outbreak of fire and there is no fire trucks and no personnel, what happen?
“However, with what is happening now, we have covered 12 zonal offices with equipment and personnel, we have also covered some states with our personnel and equipment. In the remaining states we have our personnel, but no equipment yet. Remember that the 36 states and FCT have their own fire service established by their own governments. Unfortunately many don’t have the capacity.
“So what we are trying to do as I talk to you now is that 12 of the vehicles we ordered have arrived at the port, 6 on the sea now and another 14 on the various stages of manufacturing.
“So the moment we are able to take delivery of this we would have the presence of Federal Fire Service at the headquarters of the 36 states of the federation.
“So I am imploring states to also emulate what the federal is doing. Even if they are not able to cover the entire local governments, they should be able to cover senatorial districts in their states. My intention is that in the next two years with the way we are going now, we are going to order another 23 firefighting truck this year, by the time we are taking delivery of these trucks we are extending our operations to senatorial headquarters. Our role is to complement what the states are doing.”
On the attention his agency currently enjoying from President Muhammad Buhari’s government FFS CG said: “If I say I am more than satisfied, you would say I am joking. But to be honest, I told you where we were coming from.
“As I am talking to you now, I remember when the present administration came in, we only had three functional fire trucks. And they gave us money to refurbish old ones before the new ones came. We refurbished 15, making 18 fire trucks. And those old ones are still working till today because every two years we refurbish them so that they would be working. For the new ones the federal government approved 96 and we have taken delivery of 78 now remaining 18. The remaining 18 are at various stages of manufacturing in Turkey and Austria.”
