By Kingsley Adegboye

Worried by the spate of building collapse in Lagos, members of the Lagos state branch of the Nigerian Institution of estate surveyors and valuers NIESV have taken the ‘fight’ to prevent building collapse in the state to Oba of Lagos, HRM Alaiyeluwa Rilwanu Akiolu 1 for his intervention.

Leading members of his executive council to Oba Akiolu’s palace last week, the chairman of Lags state NIESV, Mr. Samuel Ukpong said: “We know that Kabiyesi is very worried and in fact, disturbed about the frequent news of collapsed buildings in the state.

Mischievous circumstances

We know this because no reasonable king will be happy to frequently hear that his children are often killed in mischievous circumstances and buried in rubbles, and those occurrences are so rampant.”

Ukpong, a fellow of the professional body who noted that his members are equally very worried and disturbed too about incessant building collapse in the state, added that “We often ask ourselves that has any estate surveyor and valuer been involved in any of the collapsed buildings? The best of the answers we have so far received is, none.”

According to the chairman, “We now look at the Marina skyline and find those multiple storey buildings dotting Broad Street and Marina and ask, why have they not collapsed till date? The truth is that most of them were project managed  by estate surveyors and valuers, the professionals that are vast in land acquisition, site selection, feasibility and viability appraisal, project management, property management(British) or facility management (Americans).

“The Europeans brought these to us, practiced them while they were here. They taught us how to practice them and when they left we refused to continue. Your Royal Majesty, you would recall the works of Knight Frank and Rutley then called Fox and Co. and many other indigenous firms that operated then.

“They were involved in project conception, project management and property management and we had more organized cities and society then. Suddenly every other professional in the built environment thought that what the estate surveyors and valuers knew and could do, can be done by them and we became known, called and addressed as estate agents and today, the buildings are collapsing, the cities are decaying and the environment blighted”, Ukpong lamented.

He, however, expressed optimism that this negligence can be corrected by stipulating that no development in Lagos State above four floors should not be approved without the inclusion of a consultant estate surveyor and valuer who by training and experience knows what to do about the enormous responsibility of  his profession in every project.