There are strong indications that the recently collapsed 21-storey building in Ikoyi, Lagos, has no insurance coverage, IgbereTV investigation revealed.
As of yesterday, insurance operators under the auspices of the Nigerian Insurers Association (NIA) as well as the insurance brokerage fraternity, that is, the Nigerian Council of Registered Insurance Brokers (NCRIB) were still searching for the likely insurer of the building, but to no avail.
NIA is a body of 58 insurance and reinsurance companies in the country while NCRIB is a council of about 500 insurance brokers across the federation.
Although, building insurance is part of the requirements for documentation and approval to construct such an edifice, insider sources said the contractors have little regard for insurance coverage, seeing the cover as a waste of money.
For a building of this magnitude, industry source disclosed that the premium for All-Risks Construction Liability Insurance coverage is about one per cent of the entire building project, which invariably means the premium the owner of this building could have paid is about N500 million or less.
The premium, if paid, could have covered that cost of rebuilding the collapsed structure, compensation for the third parties involved, including families of the deceased victims as well as the other properties affected by the disaster.
However, without insurance, it puts pressure on Lagos State government to cough out fund by all means to compensate the families of the victims from the purse of the state, which ordinarily should not have been so had the project been insured.
Similarly, the collapsed building whose contractor was Fourscour Heights Limited also had two other towers within the premises of the collapsed building, although the two towers are within the range of 16 floors. Sources, however, indicated that there is a high chance that the other two buildings may not have been insured as well.
Efforts to trace the contractor for reaction were unsuccessful as there was nobody linked to the contracting company, aside the deceased boss. Effort to contact the company through its website failed as the company was not registered with any known website.
And with a judicial panel set up by Lagos State government on the issue, the Lagos State Building Control Agency (LASBCA) is reluctant to speak on the issue until the panel finishes its findings.
Reacting to this development, the chairman of NIA, Ganiyu Musa, yesterday said, “As of today, no insurer has notified the association of its involvement in the provision of insurance to the building.”
Noting that the association had, last week, put in place an enquiry mechanism to ascertain whether members underwrote the building, he added that no member company had come up to state that it provided cover for the building from then till now.
Similarly, the executive secretary of the NIgerian Council of Registered Insurance Brokers (NCRIB), Tope Adaramola, disclosed that no broker had so far notified the council of its involvement in the building project.
He implored Nigerians to cultivate the mindset of embracing insurance which, he said, remains the best tool to mitigate risks.
