Chipiku fire accident in Kasungu has damaged about MK450 million goods at Chipiku stores on Monday.

Central region manager for Chipiku Dennis Kamnyamata said that the fire that is being suspected to be caused by a spark from an automatic generator belonging to Chipiku plus shop destroyed everything including the buildings.

“Our electrician has confirmed that the wiring of our generator was not good and we are suspecting that the fire has been caused due to that fault,” Kamnyamata said.

He added: “We are very concerned as Chipiku Management with lack of equipment used to put out fire at Kasungu municipal council, this shows how irresponsible the council is.

“We are disappointed because we expected the council this time around to provide the necessary service, extinguishing fire, considering the fact that we pay municipal rates.”

Kasungu Municipal Council Chief executive officer, Grace Chirwa said that the fire fighters at the municipal were damaged during demonstrations.

“We failed to take an action when the incident was occurring as all our fire fighters was destroyed by Chankhanga primary school kinds during demonstrations they did last year, and they are still grounded because the cost of repairing them is very high than expected,” she said.

Meanwhile, Chipiku stores and Chipiku plus were housed in one building and are both associates of Chipiku Malawi holdings limited.