Hargeisa: Fire at IDP Camp Kills One, Injures Nine

Hargeisa,10 Nov, 2013 (SDN) –More than one hundred families were left homeless when fire gutted today the State House camp for IDPs and returnees in Hargeisa. The fire caused the death of an elderly woman and the injury of nine others. Somaliland Red Crescent society has said that the fire started 1:30 pm local time and has been raging on until 4:30 pm in the afternoon.

The director of Marodijeh region office of Somaliland’s Red Crescent society Mr. Ahmed Essa Mohamoud said the blaze destroyed at least one hundred dwellings. “The fire flattened 99 huts belonging to the IDPs and destroyed virtually all their belongings, including bedding, utensils and clothes” Ahmed Essa told reporters.
“So far we have confirmed the death of 53 year old woman and nine others were taken to hospital with superficial burns,” Ahmed Essa, the SRCS Hargeisa office director told reporters.

It was not immediately clear what sparked the fire, but residents suspect that it started in one of the huts, which are made of straw, sticks and plastic material.

The interior minister Ali Mohamed Waran’ade and the Mayor of Hargeisa Abdirahman Mohamoud Aideed (Soltelco) have reached the camp and sent their heart-felt condolence to the family of the deceased woman, Maryan Adam Abdi.
On February this year, more than one hundred families were left homeless when fire gutted the State House camp for IDPs and returnees.

The State House Park IDP camp, one of the six major IDP camps in the country, was established some 20 years ago by Somali returnees from refugee camps in Ethiopia and Somalia, following Somaliland’s Declaration of Independence in 1991 and the end of the inter-clan strife. It is now home to some 30,000 IDPs.

SDN Hargeisa