7Days
Dubai, Apr 4: A new air-conditioned market will replace the Naif Souq, which was gutted by fire on Wednesday, it was announced yesterday. The new market will be ready in eight months, Dubai Municipality officials said. Hussain Nasser Lootah, Acting Director General of Dubai Municipality said the design for the new Naif Souq would be based on the one destroyed by the fire.
He added that a temporary market would be opened in two months time. “A special emergency committee formed by the municipality will visit the site and make arrangements to set up a new market so that all the affected shops will be able to move to the new market in two months,” Lootah said. More than 100 shops were destroyed in the fire, leaving a number of traders jobless.
Shopkeepers lost cash and goods worth millions of dirhams in the inferno. A voluntary organisation has come forward to help workers affected by the massive blaze. The Kerala Muslim Cultural Centre (KMCC) said it would give dhs20 to the workers for their food expenses every day and also co-ordinate with the Indian Consulate in Dubai to help them get new passports, which were lost in the fire.
“There are more than 1,000 workers who lost their livelihood because of the fire. Many of them come from poor families and have no other means of earnings to survive. As a humanitarian gesture, our organisation has decided to help these workers to tide over the difficult situation,” said Ibrahim Elettil.
Elettil said that the centre is ready to help any victim who approaches them irrespective of their nationality. Yesterday, another blaze gutted a paint storage warehouse in Al Quoz. One man suffered serious burns and was not expected to live. On March 26, eight men were killed in an explosion at an illegal fireworks warehouse in the same area.