A six-year-old boy was late Wednesday pulled out of a collapsed four-storey building at Mogaji Street in Ebute Ero, Lagos Island, Lagos State alive, more than 24 hours after the accident.
The News Agency of Nigeria reports that the boy whose identity could not be immediately ascertained was pulled out of the rubbles with just a few bruises on his body.
A source at the scene, however, told NAN that the parents of the boy were among those who died when the building collapsed.
NAN reports that as at Thursday morning, the number of casualties had risen to 18 as more bodies were pulled out of the rubble by volunteers. No official of the Lagos State Emergency Management Agency or the National Emergency Management Agency, which started the rescue operation on Wednesday, was at the site when NAN visited the scene on Thursday.
Meanwhile, mixed reactions have continued to trail the ugly incident which happened at about 11.30pm on Tuesday. Residents are pointing accusing fingers at the Lagos State Building Control Agency for its failure to bring owners and developers of collapsed buildings to book. They also blamed accommodation seekers for occupying such houses after they had been marked for demolition.
A civil servant, Mr. Dare Oluwalogbon, blamed political leaders for using their positions to stop the demolition of marked buildings.
“It is shocking to know that immediately such houses are marked for demolition, the owners quickly run to their relatives in power and the rest is history,” he said.
A plumber, Mr Shina Obafemi, said the failure of the government to have a clear cut policy on building collapse, in spite of its frequent recurrence, was a major contributor.
”Government on its part has never come out with a decisive policy for punishing offenders, in spite of casualties each time the incident occurred,” he said.
He urged the authorities to formulate the right laws and policies through the executive and the state houses of assembly to punish offenders.
Meanwhile, Lagos State Governor Babatunde Fashola on Thursday morning expressed sadness at the collapse of the building. He was reacting to the collapse of the building . The spokesman of the state police command, Mr. Samuel Jinadu, had said only three people died in the incident. He also said 23 persons were rescued.
In the statement posted on Twitter, Fashola said, ”We are doing everything possible to rescue the people. As soon as the collapse happened, the state emergency agencies reacted promptly. ”Presently, we have rescued 37 people, 32 were treated and released while five are still at the state hospital.
”The access to the incident site is tight but the state is using light sensing equipment to detect people that might be trapped. We implore citizens to leave the place and allow emergency and rescue experts do their job effectively.
”We will certainly rescue all the injured. Thank you.”
THE PUNCH observed that rescue work had resumed at the scene, although nobody was rescued as at 2pm.
SOURCE PUNCH
