The problem with building construction in Nigeria is that many of the people who engage in it as business to make quick and cheap money see only the gains and not the risks, Kunle Awobodu, National President of Nigerian Institute of Building (NIOB), has said.
Awobodu, who spoke at the second anniversary of the collapse of five-storey building at Ita-Faaji, Lagos Island, which killed about 25 school pupils, added that some investors in building development have the mindset of profiteering at the expense of quality output.
“Consequently, for construction work, they prefer to use quacks that would not insist on quality output. This is a major reason buildings constructed by many developers cannot stand the test of time,” he said at the event tagged ‘Building Collapse and the Lessons Learnt’.
He revealed that the outcome of many investigations on collapsed buildings in Nigerian cities has identified inappropriate management of the building process on sites as a major problem.
“The interwoven complex activities of building construction require experts in their management. However, these experts must have been licensed by the Council of Registered Builders of Nigeria (CORBON) to handle such delicate processes,” Awobodu advised.
For many victims of building collapse and experts in the built environment, lack of enforcement of building laws remains the key factor encouraging substandard and unprofessional practices.
Even where there have been efforts at prosecution in the past, such actions sometimes come too little or too late to achieve the required effects or deterrence. Sometimes, even other little efforts towards prosecution are either frustrated or prolonged.
Sentiments and political considerations have remained the clog in the wheel of justice. “The doctrine of consequence is the appropriate method that can eradicate quackery from building sites in Nigeria,” Awobodu reasoned.
“The main cause of the Ita Faaji calamity was quackery, which also remains the major cause of several building collapses in Nigeria,” he noted, disclosing that closely and generally associated to this fundamental cause was negligence with respect to appropriate building regulations and their enforcement on the part of the government.
He added that lack of accountability and failure to bring culprits to book is a factor in the series of building collapse. There have been many incidents of building collapse in Nigeria. However, Lagos accounts for about 60 percent of those incidents.
Majekodunmi David, chairman, Nigeria Institute of Architect (NIA), Lagos state chapter, said there was a need to domesticate the national building code.
Accordingly, all professional bodies in the built industry should join forces to make Nigeria better and liveable, especially in relation to the campaign against building collapse.
Niyi Olagoke, secretary, Nigeria Institute of Estate Surveyors and Valuers (NIESV), on his part, said government needed to do more on monitoring whenever construction was ongoing, and met out punishment, where necessary.
