Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu on Monday briefed President Muhammadu Buhari at the Aso Rock Villa, about the Abule-Ado explosion that left many dead and several properties destroyed.
Emerging from the briefing, the governor told journalists that “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. It is not something that anyone could have imagined, you needed to be there to see the level of destruction.”
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 up 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 stated.
He said President Buhari was interested and looking forward to the outcome of committee‘s work set up by Lagos State government.
Sanwo-Olu noted that there had never been this level of destruction before in Lagos State hence the high-powered committee in place, vowing that one of the things that will be done will be to build more roads that will bypass the pipeline right of way.
On sanctions that would be meted out for infractions that caused the explosion, the governor said: “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.
“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.”
