Against the backdrop of allegations that officials of relevant agencies of Lagos State government were engaged in undercurrent deals with developers and property owners to overlook distressed and defective buildings in the state, the government has called for the cooperation of citizens by reporting such officials wherever found.
The request comes as the state government on Tuesday, inaugurated a five-man investigative committee to unravel the remote and immediate causes of last week’s collapse of a three-storey building on Massey Street, Ita-faji, Lagos Island, in which 20 persons, including school children died, and 45 injured.
“We have read such reports in the media, but we do not have any of our officials caught to have asked for bribes from landlords to bypass any distressed buildings. However, we want our citizens who have come across any of our officials asking for bribes or engaging in any such practice in the course of doing duty, to report to the ministry, Rotimi Ogunleye, commissioner for physical planning and urban development said on Tuesday.
Ogunleye, who briefed newsmen on the efforts being made by the government to stem the tide of building collapse in the state, also urged the citizens to be whistle blowers by alerting the government about defective and distressed buildings within their localities.
According to him, this is important because officials cannot be in every nook and crannies of the state and so public involvement is required to provide prompt information. He said the move was to prevent a reoccurrence of building collapse, even as he confirmed that a total 149 buildings across the state were identified in distressed form out of which 48 were in Lagos Island alone.
The investigative committee, headed by Wasiu Olokunola, a former permanent secretary in Lagos civil service, has two weeks to report back its findings to the ministry of physical planning and urban development.
The committee is also expected to proffer remedial measures to stem further building collapse in the future, adding that the panel was also to determine the level of negligence on the part of the developer or owner and the role of the state government.
Ogunleye said the findings and recommendations of the committee would help the government take appropriate and accurate decisions on how best to check building collapse in the state.
JOSHUA BASSEY
