Apapa-Iganmu Local Council Development Area (LCDA) Chairperson Alhaja Funmilayo Akande-Mohammed has identified the two casualties in Saturday’s collapsed building at Ijora-Badia, as Malians.
She told the The Nation yesteday that the deceased were using the abandoned three-storey building at 9, Amosun Street, Ijora-Badia as a makeshift shop for their drycleaning business.
Akande-Mohammed said many of the illegal occupants had vacated the building before it crashed.
“The residents vacated the place when the government marked it uninhabitable. But the Malians used it for their dry cleaning business. This information got to us after the building collapsed. If we had such information prior to that unfortunate incident, we would have told them to vacate the place. The lives of residents are important to us. We prefer they live, do business and be prosperous than die in an unfortunate incident,” Akande-Mohammed said.
She said two others were injured.
The council chief urged residents to alert the government to defective buildings to enable it take prompt action.
“We cannot afford to be recording avoidable deaths through building collapse. We all need to be our brother’s keeper by reporting dilapidated structures to the government. People should stay away from such buildings. They should be mindful of their lives. It is unhealthy and dangerous to live in such buildings,” she said.
The Nation learnt that the Lagos State Government deployed heavy-duty equipment to pull down the structure to avoid total collapse.
The Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC), Lagos State Fire Service, Nigeria Police, National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) and Lagos State Neighbourhood and Safety Corps, among others, responded to the emergency.
Leave a Reply