By Bode Olagoke
Abuja
Minister of Interior, General Abdulrahman Bello Danbazau, has said that the present administration “will soon scrap fire service units established by ministries and government agencies and strengthen the Federal Fire Service (FFS) to function effectively.
Danbazau said parallel fire service units established by agencies such as the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) had largely eroded FFS’s performance in securing lives and property from fire disasters.
The minister stated this yesterday in Abuja during a familiarisation tour of the FFS where he expressed shock over the dilapidated and obsolete equipment with which the agency operated.
“Even before I became minister, I started wondering what agencies like NEMA have to do with fire service to set-up fire-fighting units. I think this is a misnomer that we have to address very soon,” he said.
Earlier, FFS Controller-General, Engr. Joseph Garba Anebi, told the minister that the agency “has only 1, 710 staff and operates with obsolete equipment with outdated Fire Service Act of 1963.”
He said about three years after the United Nations building was attached in Abuja by Boko Haram terrorists and a Presidential Inter-agency Committee recommended that N2.8 billion be released to the Fire Service for the purchase of trucks and modern fire fighting equipment, “the money has not been released despite series of demands made by the agency.”
