At least three corpses were recovered from the rubbles of the 21-storey building that collapsed in Lagos on Monday just as it has emerged that the structural engineering consultant to the project quit last year over differences on adherence to professional standards in building construction.
The collapsed building is a construction site for luxury apartments along Gerald Road, located in the city’s affluent Ikoyi neighborhood.
It is still not clear how many people were in the building when it fell.
Officials confirmed that three persons have been rescued and are currently being treated by medical team of the Lagos State General Hospital.
There has been differences between the structural engineering consultant, Prowess Engineering Limited and Foursquare Heights Limited, owners of the collapsed building.
Prowess Engineering Limited had in a letter dated February 20, 2020 opted out of the site, siting non-adherence to specific professional standards in the building construction project.
The company’s Chief Executive, Muritala Adewale, had written to Femi Osibona, owner of the collapsed building, Foursquare Heights Limited, formally notifying him of the withdrawal of consultancy services.
Osibona is also owner of the luxury building project, 360 Degrees Towers in the high-brow Ikoyi.
According to the letter, “We arrived at this decision based on the fact that we no longer share same vision with you as our client in terms of how the project is being executed.
“We can guarantee the integrity of the first two buildings and also works done up to the fourth floor of the third building supervised by us provided specifications have been met in terms of the required concrete strength.
“This we do not have control over as we do not have the concrete cube test results for each of the building till date. Also note that we are not taking responsibility for any other construction errors that may have occurred over time on the project.
“Furthermore, we request that the company’s name and logo be removed from the project board and also kindly notify all approving authorities of our withdrawal from the project.
“We regret this decision and the lost opportunity lost to do business together. We look forward to future cooperation in other projects.”
At the site of the collapsed building, the Coordinator of the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), Ibrahim Farinloye, said the three bodies have been moved to a morgue owned by the state government.
“The deceased bodies were pulled out from under the ruble” he said.
Olu Apata, a nearby resident and the President of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) said: “I thought it was an earthquake when I rushed out of my apartment just after 3 p.m. I felt the building move and knew something was wrong.”
Apata confirmed that the building has been under construction for the past two years and that the developer was at the site meeting with prospective buyers earlier on Monday.
Hours after the collapse, hundreds of people were milling around the site, helplessly surveying slabs of concrete piled high in a heap.
Locals were digging through the wreckage by hand. Some in the crowd were furious that an official emergency response had not started.
But the Nigerian Red Cross is also now at the scene.
Building collapses are a relatively common occurrence in Lagos, Nigeria’s largest city with a population of around 20 million people.
In 2019, the collapse of two separate buildings, including one housing a school, left dozens of people dead.