An early morning inferno has left 22 families stranded and all property destroyed at a populated compound in the Rivers State capital.
The fire which occurred at number 7, Dim Street, Mile 3 Diobu, Port Harcourt started around 12am on Friday, leaving all the residents stranded.
Property worth millions of naira were lost in the inferno but no life was lost.
One of the tenants identified as Rumene Jabin said all the occupants of the building lost everything, adding that, ” No one was able to pick anything.”
The situation became rowdy as neighbours made efforts to save and evacuate trapped residents.
A personnel from the Rivers state Fire Service, Uchechukwu Igbor blamed the incident on storage of petroleum products.
Igbor explained that but for the intervention of the fire service, the inferno would have spread to other buildings.
Meanwhile, some tenants said their Landlord’s alleged involvement in occult caused the fire.
One who narrated this ordeal accused the landlord of using mystical things to cause the fire.
The tenant who begged not to he named alleged that, ” Our Landlord belongs to a dreaded cult group. He doesn’t urinate in the toilet we all use. He comes out to the open to unrinate. How can that be possible? You build a house and refuse to use the toilet facility.
“We believe that he is involved in diverse spiritual activities. He used one of them to invoke the fire. Besides, a lot of strange things has been happening in the compound before the fire incident,” they said.
In the meantime, the incident is currently before the Azikiwe Police Division, Diobu from where officers were deployed to control the mob who were becoming violent.
