How Ikoyi Building owner, Femi Osibona died during the collapse

Femi Fourscore Osibona, the owner of Fourscore Homes, the company in charge of the 21-storey building that collapsed in Lagos, has been found dead.

An official of the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), who confirmed the development at the site, said rescue workers recovered Osibona’s body on Thursday evening.

On Thursday night, there were several security operatives on ground as the ministry of health conveyed his body away from the site.

The building, one of a group of three under construction, collapsed on Monday afternoon. There is still no official figure of how many people were in the building when the structure caved in.

Meanwhile, as of Thursday afternoon, NEMA had recovered 38 bodies.

Also believed to be trapped under the debris are Wale Bob-Oseni, a US-bound real estate dealer and executive director of African Bureau for Legislative Empowerment; Onyinye Enekwe, personal assistant to Osibona who got employed last week; Zainab Sanni, a 25-year-old female National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) member; and Emmanuel Abel, a 16-year-old boy who had travelled from Abuja to work at the site.

Meanwhile, a video has surfaced online showing how Femi Osibona, owner of Fourscore Homes, the developer of the collapsed 21-storey edifice in Ikoyi, Lagos state, resisted the sealing off of the property.

In the two-minute video clip, dated 2020, a group of men, who appeared to be officials of the Lagos State Building Control Agency (LASBCA), insisted on sealing off the building, but Osibona attempted to stop them from doing so.

He was aided by group of policemen who shot into the air to disperse the officials of LASBCA and onlookers.

On Monday, the building, which is situated along Gerard Road in Ikoyi, collapsed killing about 38 people, and with many more suspected to be trapped in the rubble.

While the cause for the collapse is not certain, Obafemi Hamzat, deputy governor of Lagos state, had said work at the collapsed building in Ikoyi was once stopped after it failed a structural integrity test.

He said LASBCA sealed off the premises for four months when some “anomalies” were observed.

Gbolahan Oki, the now-suspended general manager of LASBCA, had said Osibona was given approval to construct only 15 floors.

“He got approval for a 15-storey building and he exceeded his limit. I am on ground here and the materials he used are so inferior and terrible,” Oki had said.