Fire guts IUIU girls’ dormitory

Property worth millions of shillings was reduced to ashes after fire gutted a students’ dormitory at Islamic University in Uganda (IUIU) yesterday.
No student was injured as they were all reportedly attending their morning lectures at the time the fire broke out.

According to Alhajj Mbasa Mali, the coordinator and Dean of Students, the exact cause of the fire has not been established but investigations were ongoing.
Alhajj Mali said the police fire brigade and well-wishers had joined hands to put out the fire that affected at least 108 female students.

“It’s unfortunate that the fire broke out at a bad time when our students had just reported back to the campus,” Alhajj Mali said. The students reported back to campus last week.

Ms Firdausi Namusoba, one of the affected students, told the Daily Monitor that they were attending a lecture at about 11am when they heard sparks at the dormitory. She said they were lucky that the fire broke out during the day because it would have been disastrous if it had started at night when they were sleeping.

“We were attending a lecture when we saw smoke coming from our dormitory. We rose an alarm ran to save our property but it was too late,” the student said.

The students assume the fire could have started due to an electricity short circuit.

The police fire brigade team headed by the regional police commander, Elgon Zone, Mr Jacob Opolot, and the deputy Resident District Commissioner, Mbale, Mr Emmi Mitala, arrived at the scene a few minutes after the fire had started.

Breaking rules?
According to police preliminary investigations, the cause of fire could have been a charcoal stove.
“We saw very many charcoal stoves in this dormitory so we think one of them could have caused the fire. We suspect that some students were cooking,” Mr Opolot said.

According to the university constitution, students are not allowed to go with charcoal stoves.
This is the second time a fire incident has been registered at the university.