Rescuers hold a body after a fire at a Koranic school that killed at least 26 children and two teachers in Monrovia, Liberia, on September 18, 2019. – Emergency services told President George Weah that 28 people died on September 18, 2019 overnight, his spokesman Solo Kelgbeh told AFP, as the president visited the site in Paynesville, on the outskirts of the capital. (Photo by Zoom DOSSO / AFP) (Photo credit should read ZOOM DOSSO/AFP/Getty Images)
A school in Niger Republic with a population of 800 has been thrown into mourning after a fire outbreak killed 20 children.
Twenty School children have died after their classrooms caught fire in Niger’s capital, Niamey.
The school located in the Pays Bas area has a population of 800 students. According to Reuters, the cause of the fire which started around the entrance of the school is yet to be established.
Twenty-one classrooms built with straw were gutted by the fire, effectively trapping some students who did not have an alternative escape route.
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“Without an emergency exit, many were trapped and students were forced to scale the wall to escape. Those that died were mostly children in the preschool,” Reuters quoted a teachers’ union official, Mounkaila Halidou, as saying.
Prime Minister of Niger Republic, Ouhoumoudou Mahamadou has however embarked on a condolence visit to the school to offer his respect to the children’s parents.
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