By Chikaodi Chukwuleta
The Executive Chairman, Anambra State Physical Planning Board, Chike Maduekwe, Wednesday said that the building collapses in the state has been a kind of headache and embarrassment to the state government.
Speaking during a press briefing in his office in Amawbia, Anambra State, Maduekwe said that buildings were collapsing as if there is no regulatory body.
He noted that whenever a building collapses, there is a reason behind it which can be traced and not heaping blames on people.
Maduekwe maintained that building collapses cannot be completely eradicated, adding that “anything that involves human beings from
time to time may be erroneous. You can sequentially bring it down but you cannot completely remove it.”
He identified Lagos as one of the areas buildings are collapsing and falling, saying “there are reasons for it and whenever such happens, the first thing to do is to identify the cause of it so that such a thing will not happen again.
“I keep saying it everyday that the most regulated industry in the world is our dear airline industry but we are still having plane crashes. The accident jurisdiction or whatever they are called sees it and knows what happened and how it will be prevented but it’s not applicable to building collapses. People don’t care to know what happened. Sometimes, they blame people that are in-charge”.
According to him, the government is taking the matter seriously knowing that no government has enough personnel to do what is required to keep building but will work with consultants, nominated professional bodies, engineers, architects, builders, among others.
Earlier in his speech, the Chief Executive Officer, Anambra State Material Testing Lab (ASMTL), Ebosie Ezeoke said the major problem in building collapse is impunity, particularly now that there is economic crunch, low quality materials in rod, sometimes cement that have depreciating values but might not be necessarily the cause of collapse but naturally, there are remote causes.
