Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By richards on December 28, 2014

A town planner, Mr. Bisi Adedire, has described a statement credited to him while testifying at the coroner into the collapsed guest house of the Synagogue Church of All Nations that the sum of N20m was paid to obtain approval from the state government.

He said the approval was still being processed when the building collapsed, adding that only N343, 600 was paid by the church for the assessment of the drawings.

Adedire said in a statement made available on Friday after submitting his witness disposition to the Coroner that some section of the media had misquoted him on the amount paid for the building plan approval.

According to him, the church has submitted the architectural drawings of the building to the Ministry of Physical Planning and Urban Development for assessment and an assessment fee of over N20m was calculated but the church had yet to pay the sum before the guesthouse collapsed.

He expressed regrets at the damage the misrepresentation of his testimony had caused.

The government should compel intending developers as part of the prerequisites for approval, to hire the services of all relevant professionals that should be involved in any development exercise. The full description of these professionals should be submitted to the approving authority of the government for record purposes, Adedire said.

This, according to him, will help identify all the professionals and contractors in charge of such projects in case of any failure during and after construction.

He urged the government to engage the services of professionals and non-governmental organisations, including the Building Collapse Prevention Guild, to help it in the area of monitoring and development control.

Excerpt from:

Synagogue: N20m was not paid for approval

Category: Synagogue
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