The governor of Lagos state Mr Babajide Sanwo-Olu on Monday briefed President Muhammadu Buhari on the Abule Ado gas/pipeline explosion that killed dozens and destroyed many property.
Briefing State House correspondents after a meeting with the president, Sanwo-Olu said the president was briefed fully about the incident.
“Mr. President was very gracious to receive me and to ask me about where we are and what had happened. I was able to show him pictorially the extent and the level of destruction of what happened yesterday (Sunday).
“It is a very unfortunate incident, is not something that anyone could have imagined, you needed to be there to see the level of destruction,” he said.
He described as speculative reports that the community was close to pipeline and that a gas plant was also situated in the affected community.
“That is being speculative and that is what the committee set will find out. The experts are doing it and they will give us the full report in less than two weeks.
“There is a pipeline right of way and it was not the state government that gave that, it has been in existence since. So the issues around the fact that there were commercial gas cylinders around the vicinity are all still very speculative.
“The experts will be able to tell as what led to this incident and the lessons we all need to take away from it,” he said.
He said the president was interested and looking forward to see the outcome of the committee set up by Lagos state government.
He said there has never been this level of destruction before in Lagos state, hence the need for the high level committee put in place on the explosion.
He said one of the things that would be done is to build more roads that would bypass the pipeline right of way.
“We will be fair but we will also be firm. What is popular might not be what is right but we will do the right thing. That is what I can assure you,” he said.
On the need to check uncontrolled building and development, the governor said in less than a year, over 20 buildings have been demolished and that would continue.
“We have also marked for demolition quite a number. I will be the first to admit that given the size of the city, maybe we don’t have enough development control to manage the growth of the city.
“It is the same way we cannot control the population explosion in the country. We cannot put a border post in the city and say people cannot come in but we have been a bit proactive to ensure our building control process is a lot more transparent and quick.
“We will have them online so that people will not have to come to the government. But we will continue to appeal to our people to do the right thing. You cannot just come in and begin to build just because someone has given you an allocation. That is why I said our decision is not going to be popular but we are going to be firm in the sense that you are still going to see a lot of sanctions going forward,” he said.
