The Bayelsa government on Sunday called for the recruitment of more state residents into the Federal Fire Service to meet its employment quota.

Governor Douye Diri made the call at the inauguration of a rapid response firefighting truck at the Government House in Yenagoa.

The governor alleged that Bayelsa is marginalised in several federal agencies where the quota system is used as a criterion for employment.

Mr Diri urged the service to make deliberate efforts to employ Bayelsa indigenes to fill the quota meant for the state for the sake of fairness and equity.

“We also want to talk about employment of Bayelsans. I believe that Bayelsa is not having enough of its quota of those in the Federal Fire Service,” said the governor. “We will be really looking forward to seeing how you could increase recruitment of our people.”

The governor also called on the state command of the Federal Fire Service to kickstart a fire safety awareness programme on the radio to enlighten the people on how to prevent fire incidents and measures to take in the event of any outbreak. 

Mr Diri, who observed that the slim-built Anti-fire Truck would enhance firefighting in the state, equally urged the Fire Service to take quick steps to deploy watercraft firefighting equipment in the riverine communities to mitigate fire outbreaks, which, he lamented, claimed a few lives this year.

He added, “While we are not praying for fire outbreaks, we must be prepared to get rid of it whenever it occurs. So the deployment of this fire truck is a shot in the arm, in terms of our desire to make sure that in case of any fire incident, it is timely put out.

“We also want to see how fire ambulance crafts can be deployed to our rural areas because fire incidents are not restricted to urban areas alone. 

“Bayelsa is about 70 per cent littoral, so we will be very appreciative if the Fire Service moves with a little bit of speed in terms of deploying water craft firefighting equipment to our riverine communities in Brass, Ekeremor and Southern Ijaw local government areas.”

(NAN)