Ikoyi disaster: Father of victim in tears as death toll rises

A father of one of the Ikoyi collapsed high-rise building victims seen at the disaster scene burst into tears as more bodies were being pulled out from the rubble on Wednesday.

Distraught relatives and friends of the victims have been besieging the scene since Monday, seeking information on their fate.

Two more bodies were pulled out early Wednesday from the debris of a collapsed Lagos high-rise building, bringing the death toll to 22 people, the emergency services said.

The 21-storey building was still under construction when it crumbled on Monday in the upscale Ikoyi neighbourhood of Nigeria’s commercial capital.

Rescuers said Wednesday they had recovered 22 dead bodies so far and rescued nine people who survived, but construction workers feared dozens of their colleagues were trapped inside.

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According to one of the rescuers at the scene of the incident, the number of survivors still stood at nine, he said, adding that search and rescue operations were still on.

Hope of finding more survivors appeared to dim as the rescue operation entered the third day on Wednesday.

He had earlier said rescue workers had been communicating with other survivors still trapped under the destroyed building.

About 20 onlookers, including family members and friends of the victims, were at the site Wednesday morning.

A friend of a victim who did not want to be identified “because it won’t change anything”, said that “what they are doing is a retrieval operation, not a rescue operation”.

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Experts have decried the slow rescue operation at the scene of Monday’s tragedy and feared that over 36 hours after the disaster, chances of rescuing the people under the debris were getting slimmer.

The suspension of the General Manager of the Lagos State Building Control Agency (LASBCA), Mr Gbolahan Oki, did not assuage the anger of the public with sympathisers saying the bigger picture should unravel all those that compromised the trust vested in them, which paved the way for the developer to put the lives of many people on the line.

The emergency team comprising the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), the Lagos State Emergency Management Agency (LASEMA), the Fire Service, among others, had mobilized to the scene after the building caved in.

Experts said they ought to have achieved more in rescue operations if they had the requisite manpower and resources.