The Building Collapse Prevention Guild has recommended establishing construction laws to tackle building collapses in the country.
A partner with the engineering unit at Consol Associates Ltd, Aderonke Oyelami, made the call during a BCPG Ikoyi-Obalende Cell event in Lagos recently.
The presentation, titled “Ikoyi in Transition: From Highbrow Residential Scheme to Mixed Development: Keeping an Eye on Standards,” focused on the 3rd anniversary of the collapsed 20-storey building in Ikoyi, Lagos.
She said, “The government led by the Federal Government should urgently fulfill its constitutional duty of providing security for the citizens against building collapse by enacting a construction health, safety, and environment law that stipulates the roles of each stakeholder in building and engineering construction development processes, and their exact duties, such that where there is a failure or a building/engineering collapse it is easy to use the assigned duties to evaluate who and who have failed in implementing their duties in line with the enacted law.
“The government (under the Federal Ministry of Housing & Urban Development) should immediately pass a regulation recognising the National Building Code (with the exclusion of Part 111- Enforcement, most of which will have been considered in the suggested law above but including provision for compulsory post construction Periodic Conditions Surveys of building and engineering structures) as best practices in building and engineering design and construction processes.
“We are convinced that with the above, building and engineering collapse will become history in Nigeria and should any incident occur, it will be relatively easy to identify who is at fault and relevant punitive actions can be taken without any fear of contentions.”
According to her, there is a need to refocus safety principles in the Nigerian building and engineering industry on compensatory principles.
She added, “There is an urgent need to carve out an independent set of duties or specialisation within the building and engineering processes focused purely on construction health, safety, and environment. The duties will span both the design and construction stages of building or engineering projects.
“Costs of implementing effective CHSE on a project could be significant and if not factored into early cost advice to developers right at the inception of projects there will be a great challenge in insisting on its implementation.”
Meanwhile, an official of the Nigerian Institution of Surveyors, Lagos Branch, Olukolade Kasim, said with accurate, proper spatial and non-spatial data of the environment, geoinformatics and geographic information systems could help prevent building collapse in the following stages of development.
“With accurate and comprehensive spatial and non-spatial data about the environment, geoinformatics and geographic information systems play a critical role in preventing building collapse across all stages of development. During the pre-building stage, they support precise planning and design, ensuring that environmental and structural factors are fully considered.
“In the construction phase, GIS data aids in monitoring progress and identifying potential risks, promoting safer building practices. Finally, in the post-building stage, these technologies facilitate effective management and maintenance, allowing for ongoing assessment of structural health and the early detection of potential issues, thus safeguarding the integrity and longevity of buildings.
“By leveraging the capabilities of GIS and geoinformatics across these domains, stakeholders can collaborate effectively to prevent building collapses, protect public safety, and promote sustainable smart city for the country at large.”
