FG to prosecute culprits of building collapse

The Federal Government has approved the prosecution of individuals and organisations responsible for the incessant building collapses in the country.

The Minister of Housing and Urban Development, Ahmed Dangiwa, announced this during a meeting with the Building Collapse Committee and other regulatory bodies in Abuja.

He charged them to develop a checklist of professionals involved in the construction process to ease investigations.

Dangiwa maintained that the move aligns with the reviewed recommendations of the Building Collapse Committee with Regulatory Bodies. He stressed that the Ministry’s Committee on Building Collapse would work with relevant bodies to investigate and identify the culprits.

He urged the committee to establish principles to be observed during the inspection or assessment of building collapses. There must be a column to assign blame to those culpable.

“The checklist must ensure quality assurance of the design, concrete quality, slump, and soil tests before construction. It should include who designed the building, who certified the designer, who approved the design, and who supervised the construction to identify those culpable and stop the embarrassing tide of building collapse in the country.”

“Once there is a building collapse, we should immediately move there with them, identify it, and fill in. Once that is done, we can independently sit down and identify the culprit with tangible evidence that the person is at fault, either the design or the professional not certified, or development control has not given approval or supervision by a professional and it was converted to a different use.”

The Housing Minister stated that such information would be presented to the National Council on Housing for all to understand and be involved in the implementation.

Chairman of the Council of Registered Builders of Nigeria (CORBON), Samson A. Opaluwah, commended the Minister’s achievements within one year in office, saying, “We have a long history of building collapse, but nothing was done by the Federal Government and the Ministry.”

Opaluwah told the Minister that many regulators advocate the implementation of punitive measures on those found guilty to curb the menace of building collapse in the country.

He also called on the Ministry to resuscitate the training schools for Artisans and Technicians to train more Artisans, Carpenters, and Technicians to follow exactly the specifications in the drawings while doing their work to ensure a perfect job.

The regulatory bodies present at the meeting included the Council for the Regulation of Engineers in Nigeria (COREN), the Council of Registered Builders of Nigeria (CORBON), the Town Planners Registration Council (TOPREC), the Architects Registration Council of Nigeria (ARCON), the Nigerian Institution of Estate Surveyors and Valuers (NIESV), and the Nigerian Institute of Architects (NIA), among others.