July 10th, 2021 at 06:31 pm
The Ghana Water Company has said that it has evidence to the effect that some personnel of the Ghana Fire Service have been drawing water from hydrants and selling to the public, hence they don’t get water to extinguish fires when there is an outbreak.
Chief Manager of the GWCL in charge of Accra East Region, Engineer Emmanuel Johnson made the damning claim against the Fire Service while speaking to Joy News.
“It is public knowledge that the tenders meant for firefighting are being abused. Evidence abounds across the country on how some personnel from the Fire Service draw water from the hydrants and sell to the general public”, he alleged as quoted by Myjoyonline.com.
Mr. Johnson was speaking to the news outlet following the Makola fire outbreak that created a lot of disaffection for the Ghana National Fire Service after they failed to douse the inferno in time, leading to the destruction of traders’ goods.
Traders who had 108 shops on the three-storey building accused the Fire Service of delay in attending to the situation and unprofessionalism.
However, the service rejected the accusations and blamed their inability to quench the fire in good time on the refusal of the Ghana Water Company to provide them water, and access to the hydrants which they claimed have been sealed since 1992.
But the GWC has rejected all the accusations, saying the Fire Service should take responsibility for its failures.
“GWCL as a company cannot be dragged into the Makola market fire brouhaha because there are enough hydrants at the central business district. So they must accept responsibility for failing to quench the Makola Fire,” Mr. Johnson said.
He disclosed that there are 70 hydrants within the Accra East Region with eleven of them in the Makola area alone, therefore, the claim that the hydrants have been dysfunctional is untrue.
“GWCL can never be blamed in any way for the inability of the GNFS to fight or douse the fire on Monday to the expectation of the general public.
“The GNFS should therefore adhere to their standard procedures. Actually, they need to check all their hydrants and make sure there is water in them and stop blaming other people for their insufficiencies.”
source: pulse.com.gh