Director-General of National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), Zubaida Umar, has urged Nigerians to ensure strict adherence to the country’s building codes to avert frequent building collapse and its associated disasters.
Umar stated this when she visited the site of the Saint Academy building collapse and some of the victims on admission in the hospitals on Sunday in Jos.
The director-general, who also paid a courtesy call on Gov. Caleb Mutfwang, said that the Friday morning school collapse which claimed the lives of 22 students, with no fewer than 154 others sustaining injuries, was avoidable.
“This is totally avoidable, and it is a huge lesson for us that we need to get all the developers to adhere strictly to the building codes.
“Rather than being reactive, we need to be proactive, to avoid this sad situation and we need the synergy of states to achieve this.
“I am here to commiserate with the Plateau people over the man-made disaster that claimed the lives of many young ones and injured others.
“I want to commend my men and other stakeholders in disaster management as well as the community for their prompt response.
“What I realised is that they were paying attention and taking instructions to ensure that they saved lives,” she stated.
The director-general said that she was impressed with the synergy between NEMA and the State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) in the handling of the disaster.
In his remarks, the governor described what happened on Friday as a test case for the state.
He noted that when he came on board, SEMA was in comatose and that people did not appreciate its importance, adding, however, that the organisation had now proved to be valuable.
“We are proceeding to make sure that SEMA becomes as active as it should be.
“We were hitherto toying with the idea of having an ambulance bay but it has become an absolute necessity now, in view of what we saw on Friday.
“We, therefore, count on your assistance in any way you can to reach out to international organisations that can be of assistance in this regard,” he said.
Mutfwang also said that his administration would cascade emergency management to the local governments to ensure that council areas were up and running.
“We are starting to deal with another form of disaster, which is flood. Even a portion of the Government House fence collapsed.
“If it happened here, which is the most organised part of the town, we may be waiting for more disasters,” he said.
The governor thanked NEMA for its nationalistic approach to disaster management, stressing that this was the kind of synergy expected from the Federal Government and states. (NAN)