Members of
the Lagos-based Synagogue Church of All Nation, SCOAN, may soon be heading for
other churches, as there are indications that the State government may shutdown
the church over the last Friday’s incident.
DailyPost
recalls that a six-storey building owned by the church collapsed last week and
trapped over 80 persons to death and left others with various degrees on
injuries.
Albeit,
investigations into the disaster are still ongoing, but the lagos state
government claimed that the General overseer of the church, Prophet TB Joshua,
failed to obtain approval for the building, therefore the addition of more
floors to the existing two-storey building was unlawful.
Commissioner
for Physical Planning and Urban Development, Olutoyin Ayinde, while
commiserating with the victims of the incident, said the government was
currently conducting a preliminary investigation into the possible cause(s) of
the collapse and that the findings would be made known in no distant time
On the
claims made by the church that a ‘strange’ aircraft must have being the
possible cause of the collapse, Ayinde said the Ministry had submitted the
video clips, as provided by the Church to the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority
(NCAA) with the coordinate of the collapsed site for investigation and
professional comment.
On his own
part, Chairman of the Lagos State House of Assembly Committee on the
Environment, Tobun Abiodun, said some government officials must have been
influenced to have allowed the church construct the collapsed building
illegally which had led to the death of its worshipers.
“But my
concern is that we have town planning officers that should supervise buildings
in the state, they are accomplices.
There is no way
someone would build a six-storey building instead of four and they would say
they were not aware. I believe that they compromised standard”, he said.
Ayinde said
a team of engineers from the Ministry and other state government agencies were
taking samples from the foundation and materials from the wreckage of the
building for detailed analysis.
He added
that if there was any violation of relevant planning laws, government would
take appropriate action but would not shut down the church until investigations
were concluded.
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