Market Fires: Give Us Insurance, Traders Plead
Insurance
By Nnamdi Duru
Smarting from massive loss of goods, properties and means of livelihood due to market fires, market women in the country have challenged insurance companies to bring their services closer to them as part of the enlightenment campaign to popularise insurance among traders.
They advised insurers to toe the line of banks that in the wake of stiff competition opened shops in various markets across the country and by that means helped inculcate banking habits in Nigerian traders who before then were storing their money in their homes.
Alhaja Taibat Boroki, Iya Oloja of Balogun market who represented the Iya Oloja of Nigeria, Alhaja Abibatu Mogaji made this call at the one day seminar on "Market Fire Prevention as Catalyst for National Wealth" packaged by the Technical Committee on Market Fires, an organ of the Nigerian Investment promotion Commission (NIPC) in Lagos recently.
Delivering a goodwill message at the workshop, Boroki noted that insurance is good and stressed that market men and women were not so relaxed to think along that line.
She recalled that traders in the past do not patronise bank until a time when banks decided to get closer to them by opening outlets inside different market across the country. This move she observed helped inculcate banking habit in traders, adding, "now we are better bank customers running our different accounts with different banks".
She therefore advised insurance companies to follow the lead of banks by opening shop inside markets so that traders would not need to travel far before accessing insurance services and as such, create the much needed awareness among traders.
Reflecting on incessant market fires across the country, Boroki appealed to the Federal Government to reconsider its decision to withhold funds meant for the third tier governments in Lagos and other state where new local governments were created. She observed that in cases of fire disaster, it is local governments that readily come to the rescue of traders before any other tier of government and with their funds withheld as was the case in Lagos, unfortunate market traders would be denied of that assistance.
She also urged government to ensure that the price of fire extinguishers are brought down to enable Nigerians buy them for their shops, homes and vehicles.
Responding to the plea of the market women, the Executive Director of Nicon Insurance Corporation and Chairman of the Technical Committee on Market Fire, Mr. Sunny Adeda promised on behalf of the insurance industry that "we will henceforth struggle with traders for spaces in the various markets".
In his own reaction, the President of the Nigerian Institute of Architects (NIA), Mr. Mohammed Faworaja absolved architects and planners of blames in market fires insisting that the local government should be held responsible.
According to him, fire fighting provisions were made for every market planned by professional including Tejuosho market in Surulere in addition to passages for cars and trucks. He accused local governments of continued abuse of such facilities and allocating empty spaces to petty traders for a fee.
He argued that what is needed is a code for markets, rules and regulations for operating in markets. Other problems likely to arise following such abuses in his view include structural failure among other things.
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