Deputy Governor of Lagos State, Obafemi Hamzat said the collapsed 21-storey building in the Ikoyi area of the state had been sealed for four months.
Gatekeepers News reports that the Deputy Governor of Lagos State, Obafemi Hamzat has revealed that the collapsed 21-storey building was sealed from July to November.
Hamzat who said this during his visit to the scene of the incident on Tuesday stated that two more survivors have been rescued while the remains of 10 people have recovered from the rubble of the collapsed building.
The Deputy Governor noted that the two survivors who were rescued and currently being treated at a hospital gave conflicting figures concerning the people who were inside the building before the collapse.
Hamzat said “This is now a search and rescue operation and our mission is to get people out of here. This morning we took out two people and they are doing well in the hospital. Totally we’ve taken nine people out and they are in the hospital and some have been discharged and we’ve sadly taken out 10 dead bodies
“The operation as you can see is going on and we will not leave until we are able to account for everybody. We are responsible for the people of the state; our focus is on saving lives.
“As a matter of fact, this place was sealed for about four months sometime last year from July to November because our agency came in to do structural test and saw some anomalies and shut it down and said those things should be corrected.”
The Deputy Governor added that “The other two buildings will also be audited in terms of integrity test and of course if we see anything, appropriate actions will be taken. They were making corrective actions when this happened. At the time this happened, they were not really constructing but investigations later will show what really happened.
“This particular building that collapsed was approved for 21 floors three years ago not 15 floors, it’s the construction that failed apparently.”
Gatekeepers News earlier reported that the Structural engineering company in charge of the project had withdrawn their service in February 2020, on the ground that they “no longer share same vision with you as our client in terms of how the project is being executed.”
