Many injured as Northern Somalia Market swept by fire

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A huge fire engulfed the main market in the city of Hargeisa in northern Somalia Saturday, injuring at least 28 people and destroying hundreds of businesses, city authorities and witnesses said.

According to witnesses the overnight inferno started where old warehouses are located in the sprawling Waheen market, a vibrant business center in the city.

“The fire started from an old warehouse department and winds spread it rapidly through the market, razing multistory buildings, tea shops, groceries, restaurants, electronics stores and a meat market,” Sayid Karama, a witness told VOA Somali.

Images posted on social media showed the entire market area covered by huge flames sending columns of black smoke above the city, located in the country's Somaliland region.

During a visit to the marketplace, Somaliland President Muse Bihi Abdi said 28 people, nine of them women, were injured, and that no loss of life had been reported.

Officials said those injured were mainly traders attempting to salvage some of their wares from the burning stalls.

The cause of the fire, which some market traders blame on an electrical fault, remains unclear.

Hargeisa's mayor, Abdikarim Ahmed Mooge, who visited the burned-out market, said that the market's narrow streets and hundreds of traders, who stormed to the scene hampered efforts to immediately contain the fire by the city’s small brigade of firefighters.

"This place was the economic center of Hargeisa and even though the firefighters did their best to contain the fire, the market is destroyed, and this city has never witnessed such a massive calamity," said Mooge. “We share the pain with the traders in Hargeisa, those who lost property in the blaze. We must show the world that we are persevered because of a belief -- a belief that out of the ashes of such an inferno, a new recovery could be born.”

Several store owners who spoke to VOA reported a huge loss of property due to the fire. Somaliland authorities said a committee has been organized to assess the financial damage.

“My government would be releasing 1 million U.S dollars to help with the emergency response to the disaster,” President Bihi said.