Success Ndubuisi was sitting in one of the houses on the fifth floor of an Ikoyi residential apartment when she heard the sound of the collapsed building just opposite hers.
The impact felt like an earthquake—as if someone moved the seat from behind her—she said.
Curious, she ran to the window and saw that the area the sound came from was covered in what looked like thick white smoke.
She ran out, thinking that the house had caught fire, only to discover that the building had collapsed.
“It happened very fast,” said Ndubuisi, a cook.
The cook, who lives just opposite the ill-fated building, joined other spectators outside her residence as the first responders carried on with their duties—evacuating debris and pulling out bodies.
A 21-storey building collapsed around 2 p.m. on Gerrard Road, Ikoyi, Lagos last week Monday. The building was one of the three residential skyscrapers owned by Femi Osibona, the managing director, Fourscore Heights Limited.
The building project which started last year was to be completed in 2022 with appreciable units of flats worth millions of naira, and about 50 percent of it had been sold to some potential homeowners whose dreams were shattered when the skyscraper crumbled.
As of Saturday, 40 corpses comprising 37 males and three females, had been recovered from the site. According to reports, over 50 persons, including Osibona, his assistant, Onyinye Enekwe, and friend, Wale Bob-Oseni, were trapped in the building.
Around nine persons luckily survived the unfortunate incident with three of them treated and discharged from the hospital last Tuesday.
The six others admitted at the general hospital are Solagbade, Timileyin Oduntan, 26; and Waliu Lateef, 32; Ahmed Kinleku, 19, a national of Benin Republic; Sunday Monday, 21 and Adeniran Mayowa, 37, according to Punch.
Read also: Ikoyi building collapse: Sanwo-Olu earmarks funds for families of victims
According to an eyewitness, before the building came down, the developer was seen around the site with three police officers, pacing about, before going into the building.
“In the early hours of that Monday, we saw the developer and three police at the site. He was moving up and down, and later went into the premises,” said Chris Yagba, a security supervisor opposite the unlucky building.
The security personnel, whose view on the impact of the collapse aligned with the Ndubuisi, said he and his colleagues were discussing their activities when suddenly they felt a serious vibration in the afternoon as if there was going to be an earthquake.
“We were in a confused state. We saw the 21-storey building as it crashed completely to the ground,” he said.
First responders accused of late responder
To establish the time of the incident, a victim’s relative, Komgbenda John, said his brother David had told him of his trip to Lagos with a company to work on a building in Ikoyi.
Komgbenda said he called on 1 November, at 1:09 p.m. But David missed the call. David then returned the call at 1:12 p.m. but somehow, Komgbenda also missed it.
“I kept on trying the number but it was not going through. So, the following day, I learnt that a building collapsed in Ikoyi, which happened to the building he worked in. I’ve not seen his body,” Komgbenda said.
Eyewitness accounts say that the incident happened between 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. Various media reports also confirm the time of occurrence. It took two hours for the first responders, both federal and state, to arrive at the scene to rescue operations.
Yagba, the security man, said immediately the building collapsed, his facility manager called the emergency line, 112, hoping that they would arrive on time to save lives but there was a lot of delay in the process.
“When it happened, we were expecting to see the emergency team come to help the victims. But we did not see anybody until after about three to four hours, then they started arriving,” he said, adding by then all the rescue team were on the ground, trying to bring out the dead and living.
One of the responders who spoke anonymously to BusinessDay said they arrived at the scene at 4 p.m. and started work immediately.
First corpse a foreigner, victims body parts dismembered
Speaking on the rescue mission, Yagba who was earlier quoted said since they arrived work continued throughout the night and has been ongoing, noting that different government personalities visited the site and spoke to the press.
According to him, one of the corpses recovered on the first day included that of an expatriate.
“One of the first persons that they brought out was a Whiteman, dead. They wrapped him inside nylon,” he said.
Similarly, Michael Idowu, a chef in the same building, said he thought an accident had occurred when he saw people gathered just some meters in front of his gate.
But the onlookers told him that the 21-storey building opposite the one he works in had collapsed.
“I went there and saw the building. They rushed some people on the last floor to the hospital and some people that had their legs cut. I wasn’t sure if they survived,” he told BusinessDay.
Rescue mission still in progress, government’s effort
Although the rescue team was also accused of stopping on Friday and starting late, first responders are still at the site.
Gbenga Omotosho, who addressed journalists on Friday, said the work would continue until they are certain no one is left under the rubble. He said this while correcting reports that the workers stopped working that Friday.
“Nothing like that,” he said, “ the work is still on and it’s going to continue until we can account for everybody who went or who anybody may think may have gone in there.”
According to him, what happened was that there was an agreement with the families that those who are working should rest a little and that did not even take long.
While the Standard Organisation of Nigeria, (SON) is yet to provide information on the cause of the incident, a six-man panel was set up by the state to investigate the matter and give thorough and transparent insights.
According to the governor, the panel has 30 days to do the work. More so, the state had made provisions for some of the bodies to be identified by affected families who were asked to visit the Infectious Disease Hospital (IDH), Yaba beginning from 4 p.m. on Friday.
The government said it would conduct a DNA test for corpses that may be very difficult to identify to facilitate their identification. In addition, the state also earmarked an undisclosed amount of funds for the families of victims.
“In order to help survivors and families of the victims cushion the effect of the loss of their daily bread and the loss of their loved ones, we have set aside some money to assist in the burial arrangements, and for survivors to settle in and cope with challenges of feeding in the aftermath of the incident,” he said governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu.
