Incidence of Building Collapse in Nigeria: Case of Lagos State

Abstract

Occurrence of natural and human induced disasters the world over has overtime escalated in number and magnitude; it appears to have coincided with contemporary climate change events. The devastation in loss of lives and property as well as disruption in national socio-economic and quality of life indices has been enormous. This is more so in the less advanced countries of the world where capacity to manage disasters is quite limited. The need has arisen therefore for a thorough understanding of the situation in that latter group of countries to resolve this paradox. This is necessary for those countries to be placed in a position for a meaningful and more effective participation in global efforts in the management of urban environmental disasters.

Arising from the above, the cardinal aim of this paper is to analyze the trend and pattern as well as adducing factors responsible for building collapse in Nigeria using Lagos State as the study area. This is with a view to offering policy, planning and management implications of this phenomenon in the study area.The study has relied mainly on secondary data presented as Appendix I in a recently published book on Disaster Risk Management in Nigerian Rural and Urban Settlements. The appendix presented a total of 139 reported cases of building collapse in Lagos State over a period of 35 years. These were used for analysis and discussion. The analysis involved the use of table, chart and figures to indicate trends while spatial analysis showing distribution of the collapsed buildings was done using Global Positioning System (GPS) superimposing these as points on the thematic map of Lagos State.

Emanating from the study are the following: (1) an observed escalating rate of building collapse in Lagos State over time; (2) a concentration of reported cases in residential land use and in Lagos Island Local Government Area of the State; and (3) identified explanatory factors emanating from professionals in the building industry, developers and policy decision makers. By way of elaboration, the professionals in the building industry go about their duties independently and without an established forum for development process explanation. While the policy makers show lack of political will and influence a lot of development decisions, the system of development as well is fraught with corruption. The public also cannot be exonerated as most developers run foul of the laws governing zoning and development control and not supplying adequate building materials for construction all in a bid to minimize cost of construction. The contractors are also involved. In some situations where materials are adequately supplied, they choose not to use the right mix in order to maximize their returns. This implies that the problem of building collapse in developing countries with particular reference to Nigeria is a function of the negative contribution of the policy decision makers, the professionals and the public. The paper recommends increased political will for more effective policy formulation and implementation; removal of constraints and obstacles relating to coordination and synergy-building among professionals in the building industry; and encouragement of result-oriented public participation in urban environmental disaster management. The expected outcome of all these will increase knowledge towards sustainable urban neighbourhoods especially in developing countries.

Keywords: building collapse; coordination among agencies; disaster management; public participation; sustainable urban neighbourhoods