BY TIMOTHY AGBOR
Magistrate Court 1 in the premises of the Ebonyi State High Court has been razed by fire.
The inferno was said to have burnt exhibits and other vital documents kept inside the building attached to Magistrate Court Registrar’s office in the state high court to ashes.
The fire incident which occurred on Thursday midnight also destroyed property of law offenders seized by the court and were parked inside the court.
A Magistrate who did not want his name in print said he and some staff of the state high court who are living around the Magistrate’s Court premises, were woken up from sleep by the fire.
He said, “We were woken up by the inferno. We are living close to the court premises. When I came there, we started using our fire extinguishers to quench the fire. I shot one of the extinguishers and the fire exploded and got more serious.
“By this time, our security men had ran away. We contacted the state fire service and they came and help us to quench the fire. Before their arrival, we have exhausted our fire extinguishers”, he stated.
Nnenna Onuoha, Chief Registrar of the state high court who confirmed the incident, said the estimate of what was destroyed by the fire is about N40 million.
“On the early hours of June and that should be on 3rd June, we got calls from our people living at the magistrate quarters that our court has been gutted by fire.
“We rushed to the court and saw that the court was truly razed by fire we started asking what could be the cause of the incident. They told us that the fire was from the transformer.
“Rescuers called Ebonyi State Fire Service and they came and helped us to quench the fire. As you can see, the building was completely gutted by fire.
“Rough estimate of the property should be up to about N40 million. Most of exhibits in the court were gutted by fire,” she said.
