As the Federal Government looks to rebrand the fire service for efficiency, experts have advised that it should strengthen awareness campaign on fire safety mechanisms to prevent and reduce incidence of fire outbreak in the country.
They said that the incidence of fire emergencies in the country could be partly attributed to poor awareness level on fire safety measures.
According to the National Coordinator of Safety Advocacy and Empowerment Foundation, Nigeria , SAEF, Kadiri Shamusideen, the national attention given the service after it has been neglected for more than a decade but also pleaded that the N4.6 billion intervention fund dedicated to improve the sector be utilised for visible results.
The Minister of Interior, retired Lt.-Gen. Abdulrahman Danbazau recently said that the funds would be applied in the purchase of fire-fighting equipment, improve on existing facilities, training, recruitment and welfare of the personnel.
The Program Director of NFPAWA, Mrs Anthonia Beri, added that government should also facilitate the formation of voluntary fire fighters to complement the activities of career fire fighters as the regular fighters were yet to deliver to expectations.
“It will be more rewarding to set up a fire-fighters-club like it is in advanced country, which should be a citizen volunteer organisation like the Red Cross, where able bodied men and women are encouraged to be members and are trained from time to time on the basics of fire safety and firefighting as this would go a long way to enhance the job of firefighting.
Agreeing with Beri, Shamusideen said noted the existence of voluntary rescue would also assist in increasing fire safety awareness in the neighbourhood.
Shamsudeen said that the forthcoming conference and training put together by NFPAWA on Fire Enterprise Risk Management was relevant in this wise.
The training is coming up in May at Oriental Hotels in Lagos and would highlight the standards and requirement for attending to emergency situations, importance of having a robust fire safety management in workplaces for business continuity as well as bring to focus how organisation can proactively prevent fire occurrences
