THE JOS SCHOOL BUILDING COLLAPSE 

The Jos tragedy has again raised questions of integrity in many structures

It was difficult to see beyond the sorrow in the air. Last week, mourners sang farewell hymns for Emmanuel Dennis whose lifeless body was found in the morgue, a day after a building housing a private secondary school in Jos, Plateau State, collapsed. “My boy was a good boy,” his grief-stricken father Victor Dennis told the media. “He didn’t deserve to die. They killed my son. He didn’t do anything wrong. He just went to school to learn.” Emmanuel was among the 22 students that died when the two-storey building collapsed on the children, trapping about 130 of them and injuring many. Like the recent mine pit which collapsed at Shiroro in Niger State, many parents and local rescue workers initially resorted to bare hands and shovels to reach some of the trapped children.

While we join others in commiserating with the families of the victims, the Jos building collapse has once again raised grave concerns about the safety and integrity of many structures across the country. Some angry residents of Jos North local government area claimed the students heard some troubling sounds in the building the previous day, while others suspect that mining activities near by could have affected the school building. But the state Commissioner for Information, Musa Ashom had no equivocation, saying the school building was compromised. “Even as a layman who is not a building professional, you can see that the materials used in the construction are not standard. But we will investigate the cause of the collapse and punish those found culpable.”

Last Tuesday, the preliminary report of an investigating panel instituted by the Nigerian Building and Road Research Institute (NBRRI) confirmed these fears. The panel headed by Frederick Job, a professor in the Building Department at the University of Jos, revealed that the physical observation of the building looked distressed while weak materials were used for the building. The report also observed that the quality of the concrete used to construct the two-storey building was in doubt, as there was no boundary between the concrete and the steel reinforcement. Besides, the report noted the slab reinforcement anchorage provided for the structure was inadequate. Unfortunately, this is a familiar story. The frequency of building collapse in Nigeria is disturbing, as many stakeholders express the need for stricter enforcement of building codes and regulations to prevent such occurrences and protect lives.

In the last two weeks, many buildings have collapsed, sowing deaths and fear among the populace. Recently in the Federal Capital Territory, (FCT) Abuja, three buildings collapsed in three days. In other climes, buildings don’t just collapse every other day. That is because there are procedures to follow when constructing a building. But in Nigeria, these conventions are hardly adhered to because of poor enforcement of laws.

Authorities at all levels should therefore be concerned that too much blood is being spilled needlessly in Nigeria’s building industry for all sorts of reasons that even professionals in the sector recognise as avoidable. Cases of building collapse cut across offices, schools, residential areas, churches, and business premises. Yet, the construction of a building, according to the Nigerian Society of Structural Engineers, “is expected to be managed by qualified professionals including structural engineers, mechanical engineers, electrical engineers, architects, quantity surveyors,” among others. Lack of professionalism in the industry has led to unethical dealings like the use of cheap and inferior materials, improper supervision, distortion of original building plans – like when a 10-year-old two-storey building has five floors added onto it without approval.  

As we have consistently advocated, there is an urgent need for a complete overhaul of the nation’s building and construction regulations. A policy should be put in place whereby any professional connected with a collapsed building should forfeit their license and face the full weight of the law. The land upon which the collapsed building was erected should be forfeited to the government.

Buildings marked for demolition by town planning authorities, should be demolished without delay. Unless drastic steps are taken and building codes implemented to the letter, the nation will continue to have these avoidable serial disasters.