City houses burn

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TWO houses in Bulawayo’s Nketa 9 and Pumula East suburbs were gutted by fire caused by electrical faults yesterday and on Monday.

[one_sixth_last]TWO houses in Bulawayo’s Nketa 9 and Pumula East suburbs were gutted by fire caused by electrical faults yesterday and on Monday.

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The Nketa 9 house caught fire yesterday just after electricity resumption following hours of load-shedding.

Occupants of the rooms that were badly affected by the fire were not at home when it broke out.

“There was no electricity from morning and some few minutes after it returned in the afternoon, the next thing I saw was thick smoke coming from next door,” Kalubu Mathe a neighbour, said.

Mathe said she went outside and saw her neighbours’ house in flames and immediately called the fire brigade.

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Neighbours rushed into the house and rescued Rosemary Nkiwane’s minor children who had been alone at that moment.

Nkiwane, who shares the house with the two occupants from whose room the fire started, said she was convinced an electrical fault triggered the fire because the young men always forgot to switch off electrical gadgets whenever they left the house.

When Southern Eye visited the scene, the fire brigade was still trying to ascertain the cause of the fire.

The room where the fire started was extensively damaged.

In the Pumula East fire, property worth more than $2 500 was destroyed on Monday.

House owner Siphathekile Sibanda said the fire started in the main bedroom and she suspects a faulty socket where some electrical appliances were connected could be the cause.

“I was at the shops when my son ran to me shouting that the house was on fire,” a distraught Sibanda said.

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Her son Brighton Mbano said the house caught fire at around 9am.

“I received a call from the neighbours telling me the house was on fire,” Mbano said.

“I dashed home and together with the neighbours tried putting it out before the fire brigade arrived.”

By the time the fire brigade arrived at the scene, some property had already been extensively damaged.

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