PUTATAN, June 17 (Bernama) — “When I was walking home and saw thick smoke from afar, it did not strike my mind that it was my house on fire and this incident left my family homeless,” said Zaiton Jamatin, a victim of a fire in Kampung Contoh, Petagas here last night.
Zaiton, 56, said, nothing was saved because there was no one in the house at the time of the incident.
“As soon as I came home I was shocked to see my house was razed to the ground and there was nothing we could do,” said Zaiton who has been living in the village for 40 years.
More than 10 houses caught fire but there were no casualties reported in the incident.
Another victim, Yati Bania, 45, said when the incident occurred at about 9 pm, she panicked and kept shouting fire.
“I had just come out of the house as the fire spread quickly so I did not have time to save important items including identification documents,” she said.
Meanwhile, Madzin Pulau, 40, said although the fire spread quickly, he managed to save important documents.
“However, I couldn’t save other belongings but what is important is that none of my family was injured in this incident,” he said.
A form two student Nor Syafina Mohd Azmi, 14, said at the time of the incident she was doing her school homework in the room.
“When, I heard screams of fire outside the house, I just ran out of the house, leaving the books behind,” she said.
Meanwhile, Community Development and People’s Wellbeing Minister Datuk Shahelmy Yahya said the government would provide as much help as possible to ease the burden of the victims, including providing temporary shelter.
“I am reviewing the situation here today and to get detailed information from the Disaster Operations Control Centre in order to identify what immediate assistance needs to be channelled,” he said.
He said a temporary evacuation centre had been opened at Dewan Sri Putatan since yesterday but only 29 victims from six households came to the evacuation centre.
“I understand the fire involved a total of 17 households with 76 victims. However, the other victims decided to temporarily stay with their close relatives,” he added.
Source: BERNAMA News Agency