Two die, six injured as government building collapses in Ogun

Tragedy struck in Abeokuta, Ogun State capital on Friday morning when one of the buildings in a shopping complex owned by the state government still under construction at Itoku Market, collapsed.

Two of the injured survivors rescued at the site later died in the hospital.

The victims were all construction workers at the site, it was learnt.

Saturday PUNCH learnt that the collapse of the four-storey building occurrred around 8.30am as work commenced at the site.

The spokesperson for the National Emergency Management Agency in the South West, Mr. Ibrahim Farinloye, told one of our correspondents that 16 construction workers in the building were rescued alive, while an injured worker died on the way to the hospital.

One of our correspondents at the scene later learnt that another worker died, bringing death toll in the collapse to two.

The construction workers were said to have reported for duty before tragedy struck on Friday.

Governor Ibikunle Amosun, who got to the collapse site at about 9am expressed sadness and took responsibility for the tragedy.

He also confirmed that the 16 persons, who reported at the site in the morning had been accounted for.

Amosun, however, insisted that rescue operation would continue until it got to ground floor.

He gave the assurance that investigations would be conducted into the cause of the building collapse.

According to him, the government has about 20 more buildings around the site. He assured that an integrity test would be conducted on all of them to ascertain their structural viability.

He said, “I take full responsibility of what happened here, not even the Commissioner for Works can take the responsibility because when the glory comes we share it together but if anything goes wrong, I take the blame. But we are going to get to the root of the matter”.

“We can’t leave this place the way it is, because it is better for us to act under caution. We are not that comfortable with the way this place is and that is why we have to get to the ground-zero. We will get there before we leave the site.

“We are going to find out the cause of the collapse. When you look at this building particularly, you will discover that the topography of this side of the building is lower and that is why we have the basement here.

“We didn’t pray for this but we are going to double-check other state projects to determine their structural viability. We are very sad about the fact that we lost lives.”

He had yet to leave around 5pm.

He was there monitoring the rescue operations, with his deputy, Mrs Yetunde Onanuga, the Speaker, state House of Assembly, Suraj Adekunbi, and almost all the members of the state executive council.