The Commissioner for Capital City Development, Chief Sunday Elechi Inyima on Wednesday, recieved the report of Investigative panel set up to unravel the immediate and remote cause of collapse of three storey building under construction in Udensi axis state capital, recently.
Recieving the report in his office, the commissioner thanked the panel for successfull completion of the assignment. He attributed the alarming nature of building collapse in the state especially, in recent times to infiltration of quacks into the built profession and celled on the professional to rise up to the challenge and join hands with Government to sanitize the profession for the safety of the people.
The commissioner equally called on developers to avoid using short cut but should rather follow the procedures approved by the ministry of capital city development and engage professional at all levels of the building.
"The Chairman, co- chairman and members of this Investigative committee, I welcome you. Having completed this assignment that was given to you on the 20th of June this year, because of the ugly incident of building collapse at plot 23 Nnodo Udensi Government layout, here in Abakaliki.
"The issue of building collapse has become very warisome especially in recent times. If not for God's grace, not less than one to two persons might have been lost to that collapse.
"I want to say that none of the approval of the collapsed structures were given in the lifespan of this present administration. As far as we're concerned, we made sure that due diligence and proper supervision are followed in building approval in any structure in the state particularly those within the capital city.
"We cannot fold our hands and watch this happen and that was why we set up this Investigative panel to unravel the immediate and remote cause of the building collapse and help us in proffering solution on how we can prevent such from happening again.
"But I want to say, from ordinary man point of view, the main thing here is for developers to accept and agree to do the right thing at the right time. Immediately you have a conception of developing a structure, always try to start with the ministry of capital city development. They will guide you. We have a code here, we have regulations here guiding development but when people try to cut corners, when people try to engage quacks. Quacks does not only mean people that are not professional, it also means when a professional is doing a job that is not within his profession. An architect after drawing a building want to supervise the building, I consider it as quackery. This is what we want to stop in building development in this state.
"On behalf of the state government, I receive this report from you and I assure you that it will get to the governor and every decision taken will be made known to public.
"I want to commend you for the job well done as I invite you to join hands with the ministry to eliminate the menace of building Collapse in the state", he concluded..
Speaking to journalists shortly after submitting the report, the Chairman of the Investigative panel, Engr Enyinna Eni said, at the course of Investigations there were a lot of findings, according to him, so many process and specifications were not followed which led to the collapse of the building.
"The findings were enormous because in building construction, the process involved are many
"We were able to look from the foundation to the entire stages of the work. From our findings, the excavation depth on the foundation was very shallow. And from the soil analysis we did, there's a recommended depth any structure of that level of building in that area should be able to have. Moreso, what they did in terms of excavation was in contrary to what they supposed to have done.
"In terms of the concrete mixture which is a very serious aspect of construction, every of the structural member that were tested failed our test. They are not in any where, near standard. So, we can say, the concrete work was of poor quality.
"We can tell you they was poor workmanship generally in the field because of lack of supervision. Also there was alterations to what was designed compared to what was done in construction.
"I can tell you there were whole lot of mess as regards the whole aspect of the construction. If you have been to the site you find out that everything collapsed, it was not a partial failure, this is because they was gross error in terms of construction, in terms all the structural element and that was what resulted in the total collapse of the building.
"A lot of findings were made that was backed up by scientific test. We also made recommendation that would forestall future occurrence, so many of them and we hope Government will act of them, because if they do not act on them it is as good as we're back to square one. But If the recommendation are strictly adhered to, we as good as clamping down on illegal structures", he stated.
A member of the panel, Engr Chibueze Matthew also corroborated the point raised the Chairman of the panel, Engr Enyinna Eni.
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