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Building or Pack of Cards? By Bosah Chinedu National Secretary Education Right Campaign (ERC) As the clock ticks, so is the countdown to when the next building will collapse. Across the federation, it is one collapse or the other and its attendant casualties. The building that collapsed on Tuesday March 24 2009 at Idi-Araba area of Lagos, wherein 11 persons died, several injured and properties worth several millions of naira perished, has further and clearly put to question the housing policy in Lagos and other parts of the country. Without sounding pessimistic, more is still very much on the way, considering the state of anarchy in the housing sector and urban/community development. The Education Rights Campaign (ERC) commiserates with the affected families. The housing crisis has gotten to a level where would-to-be buildings collapse at the point of construction; this time around it is workers that are the casualties unlike occupants who are always affected. Casualties associated with collapsed building in Nigeria remind one of a war situation. In the last few years there have been several cases of collapsed buildings in Nigeria. Just to mention a few, a building under construction in Aba in March 2006, collapsed killing 11 workers; on July 18 2006, another 4-storey building collapsed at Ebute-Metta area of Lagos killing 25 persons; in July 2008, 4-storey shopping complex under construction in Jabi, Utako district of Abuja collapsed and killed 3 persons amidst several injuries. How have authorities responded to the collapse of buildings? It has been more of media fanfare and grandstanding. The best we hear is that the owners of the collapse building owners will be arrested; the land will be seized by the government, no more, any less. So far, Nigerian leaders have no housing policy, let alone well articulated one. These long years of neglect and abandonment have created room for anarchy wherein buildings that are erected defy the least laid down standard. Most buildings today are built for commercial interest alone. This is responsible for the bypassing of the services of professionals like architect, surveyors, structural engineers etc. In some cases where professionals are part of the building, we still find cases of unprofessional conducts. If we all agree that we have problems with electricity, education, health etc., we have more problems in the housing sector. This is a country where in most cases, a room houses 10 persons with many sleeping under the bridges, makeshift stalls and market places. It is not by mistake that costs of renting a house in the last 7 years have gone up by 200% in some parts of the country, since population have outpaced the available houses in most urban areas such as Lagos, Port Harcourt and Abuja etc. This is the only country where tenants pay outrageous 2-3 years rent in addition to all kinds of charges ranging from agent fees, agreement fees! Despite the widespread usage of substandard building materials, maintenance is completely missing; the use of housing is usually changed from apartments to warehouse without recourse to the capacity of the building. When we had government intervention in the sector housing in the 1970s and early 1980s, it was relatively far better-at least we are yet to see any publicly built houses collapse; the recent intervention by different government has been pro-rich. For example, Alhaji Lateef Jakande betweem 1979 and 1983 built a number of low cost housing estates in Lagos. But what we have now are houses built by government selling between N5million to N10million, which can only be bought by a few privileged rich. Most states of the federation do not have budget allocation for houses and when there is budget allocation, only few benefits from it. In 2009 federal budget, works, Housing and Urban development got N208billion and this is largely meant for construction of roads across the federation. The Education Rights Campaign (ERC) calls for a planned national policy on housing that should be embarked upon by the all the states and federal government and will bring about massive investment in housing with the aim to meet the needs of Nigerians in terms of affordability, quality and availability. Such housing policy should be geared towards bringing down the cost of constructing houses vis-à-vis building materials such as cement, sand, steel, manpower etc. We must work towards producing virtually all the materials but when necessary importation should be solely carried out by government, contrary to importation by few profit merchants. The moribund Ajaokuta steel and Cement production must be revived and run under workers and community control and management with the aim to forestall sabotage, exploitation and mismanagement. Like in Britain, the local and state governments in Nigeria must play central role in the housing industry. Building should not be seen in isolation of other sectors. Meaningful urban development entails planning such will accommodate housing, packing space, electricity, schools, markets, hospitals, recreational centres etc. Anything short of this is to promote the existing state of anarchy, waiting for the next building to collapse while political office holders continue to shed crocodile tears - the game they know best. Chinedu Bosah National Secretary Education Rights Campaign (ERC) |