Fierce fires cause havoc on Uluguru mountains

Morogoro. Massive fires have continued to rage at Uluguru Mountains for five consecutive days yesterday and efforts by conservationists to put it off appeared to have yielded no fruit.

The fire was said to have been caused by people living and carrying out human activities in and around the mountains. The conservationists from Uluguru Nature Reserve (UNR), which is under the Tanzania Forest Service Agency (TFS), are working to control the fire with no significant success because of the geographical nature of the high hills, valleys and rocks in the mountains.

The fires were initially spotted burning some area of the mountains on October 5, this year, before spreading further to other areas of the mountain, thereby threatening water scarcity to residents of Morogoro, Dar es Salaam and Coast regions as the mountains are the water source for the regions.

When contacted, UNR chief conservationist Karani Sekiete confirmed the fire devastation on the mountains, which had been safe from fire over the past three years.

Mr Sekiete said before the fires resurfaced, people living around the mountains were being educated to conserve nature by various environmental stakeholders including the UNR conservationists.

The UNR chief conservationist admitted that the flames were spreading very fast because of dry spells, strong winds as the firefighters had sometimes been failing to do their job well because of high hills, valleys and rocks.

“Residents as well as environmental stakeholders have a role to play in conserving and protecting these mountains and not government alone because the effects of detruction will be felt by everybody” said Mr Sekiete.

Mr Sekiete said that no one had so far been caught for starting the fires but suspected that hunters and miners could be the cause, adding that rains would be the only solution to extinguishing the fires.