Cultural artifacts worth millions of Naira were destroyed in a fire outbreak at the Abuja Arts and Craft village, located behind the Sheraton hotel which started around 9pm on Friday.
Some traders interviewed by our reporter on Saturday said 18 shops out of 75 in the market were affected by the infernno before it was brought under control around 11 Pm, by fire fighters.
The traders claimed they were denied access to the premises when they made effort to combat the fire befre the arrival of firefighters.
Responding, a senior official of the security guards on duty who would not disclose his name, denied the allegation of blocking the traders from accessing their shops as they alleged.
He said: “In the fear of not to allow the hoodlums from taking any advantage of the incident to loot the shops, we locked the market’s gate until when the fire service men arrived.”
The Divisional Police Officer of Wuse Zone 3, CSP Yakubu Sulaiman
