 Govna Babajite, son-in-law of Lagos State, has inaugurated a six-member panel of inquiry to investigate the cause of the collapse of the 21-story building in Iqoi. He also signed an executive bill to give legal back into the panel. During their period of sit-in, the panel will be chaired by Toyin Ayinde, the president of the National Institute of Town Planners. He urged the panel to be professional and factual in their findings in order to give closure to the families of those who lost their lives in the incident. Joining us to discuss this is Niyi Babade, an international journalist. Good evening. Thank you very much for joining us, sir. Thank you for having me on the programme. So I started the conversation yesterday with regards to the panel of inquiry, interesting personalities. It has Mr Toyin Ayinde is the president, Nigerian Institute of Town Planners. Dr Akintilo Idris Adelike, a structural engineer, has an architect, has Mrs Bumi Ibrahim and a couple of others. Interesting profile, you know, across board. But my question, you know, which I started yesterday was, should this be a situation where we are setting up a panel or should this be a criminal investigation? Well, I am happy you said something now that I really liked. Must we wait till, where were all these people, I mean, all these professionals when the building was being erected, where were they? Why weren't they consulted? Why was their opinion, I mean, nobody asked them for their professional advice then. Why must we wait till after life has been wasted? That is the definition of Nigeria. I always say something, anytime I'm talking on any forum, that Nigeria, we do things, we are so peculiar. I don't know why. We do things that the ways is never done elsewhere in the world. Right. Thank God, so we have all these people. How come we cut corners? How come we bypass professionals like this to do things the Nigeria way? You know, it starts from the way where you see, I live on the island. When I was given the time to come, I left my home around five to make a seven-thirty appointment. I'm sure this is because of the training I've got in the past, working, holding thoughts for an international organization in Africa for several years, right? Normally, I would have said, oh, Nigeria time I should be there, but I now used to be waiting for me, or the studio would be waiting for me. You see, we need, there are fundamental issues that we need to address before we can move forward. I can bet it with you. At the end of, we have both people, I'm quoting now, both people who will ask questions. I can bet it with you that after the governor set up all these professionals to investigate the course of the building, you will see, we won't have the outcome. I'm not causing neither. I'm just saying, at the end of the day, the results, the report, the communique, the whatever, the cover with, we might not hear about it anymore. We might hear about it, but the story might be doctored because this is Nigeria. I was reading something just now, as if the person who sent it to me knew I was coming for a program. He said, at the seven day when God was wrestling, devil sneaks to create African leaders. And you say, sorry, it's not funny that when God was wrestling at the seven day, devil sneaks to create African leaders and their class captain is in Nigeria. Well, it's heartbreaking. It's heartbreaking. And the reason, you know, all these questions will come up. And I also was saying to myself earlier that I think one of the challenges that Nigerians have, I don't know if you would agree, is that aside government, that we as a people don't really value the Nigerian life. And the reason I'm saying that is if we did, if we saw that every single person, you know, this is close to 40 now, as at last count, who has lost their life in this incident, if every single one of those lives did matter, we would not be in an environment where a panel is set up to wait for 30 days for, you know, results. We would instead be asking that every single detail of what happened leading up to the event on Monday and being investigated. And that includes, and I've said this over, that that includes the search and rescue efforts and the lackluster attitude of search and rescue efforts. Let me tell you one thing again. Nigeria is the only country where that added, that who, yeah, he would place the Piper, dictate the tune, this, you will remember the issue of Oga at the top. Right, the issue of Oga at the top came in when the guy was haxed, what is your website? He was pinned, he was probably was thinking, oh, if I give my website or office website out, my Oga at the top might get upset. Look, I thank God, I don't think, even when I'm coming again to the next world, I want to be a journalist, a foreign journalist, not a Nigerian journalist. No, no, no, I don't want to be the Nigerian journalist. I see my contemporaries, I see how the slant of their story and I say, oh, because he's giving you, the Brown envelope is appreciating you, you don't tell it the way it is, which is sickening. In those days, journalists, journalists were, after the reverence during the Church of England, in those days, the next person that were expected and believe had the love of the people that are trustworthy were the journalists. But now, the things are really, really changing. Why am I saying all this? If at this stage, the panel were given, they were set up and by tomorrow, look at the scenario surrounding the whole thing, the place had been sealed before by government official. But because of our own way of doing things, our ways of doing it the crooked way, somebody went and go to the highest authority who unsealed the place and life continues and now see what we got, right? That is the Nigerian trend. You just said it. The cheapest thing to waste in Nigeria is life because it has no value to nobody. The cheapest thing to waste in Nigeria is life. It's just like you're buying goodie, I mean, you're buying the cookies on the road. That's how they waste life here, right? I, sorry, I keep referring to journalism. You know, in international journalism, if you are not sent on outside environment course, which I attended several times outside London, as for sure, you are not allowed to go to cover what you call it, student riots or two people fighting on the street, right? Your organization will be liable if anything happened to you. Here in Nigeria, they will send you to war front because they believe it should be where it's getting the salary. What's stupid salary? So that's how wasteful life can be on this side of the device, right? So whatever I, you remember, was to be called to the black people of South Africa where the black police were used against the black. It said, black man, you are your own. Nigerians, you are your own. So you don't believe or trust that this panel, the six-member panel, will be able to? I give kudos to this panel, professionals to the call, intellectuals, people of high repute, but will they be given free hand to operate? Wouldn't there be one announcement from Abuja saying, ah, that's all we're talking about here? But also, can a criminal investigation be going on side by side with the panel? And unfortunately, we're in a country where if the governor himself or the president or the IGP doesn't give a go ahead for an investigation, the police really can't ignore it and act like it didn't happen. So would you expect that in a system that works, they don't need to wait to be told to resume or to begin a criminal investigation into this matter while the governor sets up whatever the matter is to set up? My dear brother, the people, the panel are only to investigate the cost of the collapse, right? Why? Was it due to a substandard product that would be used or what do you call it in Nigeria? Should it short change thing that we all do? Or there are no body on that panel who is going to be investigating, who is going to be investigating criminal investigation? Right? If you want to bring in criminal investigation, you bring the likes of the DSS, we don't have FBI in Nigeria, the likes of the police and what have you, then we know that, yeah. But this is just like we're patching what is unpatchable. And this is a pity. This is what has been happening in Nigeria subsequently. Put, say it anywhere. I will tell you, I'm not predicting them. You will see, at the end of the day, the people will start and they will go back and say, this is what we find out. And somebody will say, okay, thank you. Collect the report, take pictures and put the picture out to the public for Rabu Raoza. So they say, oh, they're doing well. But the main thing, the main thing they were asked to do, they may, you will discover that at the end of the day, you will see that nothing will come out of it. I can bet it will do. I'm so sorry, saying all these things, right? You know, I'm saying sorry, saying all these things. But this is what we know. This is what I've been, I saw the investigative journalism. So you should know that. I know how we are, who we are and what we are. How do you think that the people of Lagos can put pressure on the government to ensure that there is a criminal investigation into this or that the panel doesn't waste Lagosian's time for the next 30 days and eventually nobody gets to pay for, or answer for these debts? Unfortunately, the owner of the building died with the building. That is one reason why criminal investigation will be dropped and has to go down the drain as part of, that is one major schemes. But if we are a nation, the Nigerian nation that are supposed to learn, from past problems or atrocities and what a view, we shouldn't find ourselves in this situation. Look at all the story. Oh, he got approval for eight-story building. Later, he got approval for 15-story building. Somebody has to lose his job because he said, no, it was also 15-story building. But now he went to 80, now he's now 21, and somebody has to lose his job. That is the kind of justice you get in the society where, like I said, he will dictates the tune, I mean, he will pace the pipe and dictates the tune. That's the Nigerian society. And if we continue like this, if we continue like this, there are fundamental issues, there are fundamental problems that we are ignoring just for the sake of, oh, no, it's not, oh, I don't know, I was, somebody said something when they said, they were taking the Anglican, I did not assist them because I have no Anglican. They came to take the Catholic, I did not come out because I was not a Catholic, they went and took the Presbyterian, I did not show it to them because I was not part of the Presbyterian. Now, they've taken all those people away, they've come to take me, who now will fight my cause. They're forgetting that they, okay, look, the government of my state, by the former government of my state, I of Ioshe, was hoping on Okada, right? If Dorin is tenured as the governor of Iquiti State, if we are just this little power, the regional power from Iquiti, to say, no, this has, must not be this, we must do this the way I see it overseas that I travel to virtually every other week, he wouldn't have been hoping on bike when there was traffic, there would have been solutions to Nigerian problem. We will all come back, we will all come back to our sheets, to whatever we do now. So I don't think, just like I said, I wish the panel good, I wish them good deliberation, I wish them good results, but I can bet it will do my profile. Those people are not here, they are not being appointed or whatever to do criminal investigation, they are just to give reasons why the building collapse. So we forget criminal, nobody will get any justice anywhere, you and I know that, we are all Nigerians, we are all Nigerians. Yes, well, I would understand what he, you know we are Nigerians. But it shouldn't be that way, and if you've been following the story, the video clips that you see every day, you see family members crying, you see people weeping and hoping that they would find some glimmer of hope. You remember, I flew in from England to cover the, was it the Soso-Liso or? Soso-Liso, I think it was Soso-Liso, one of the, yeah, that crashed. And the guy said, he told his boss, before he left, that this plane will not get to where it was going, they say, oh, manage it to legal, manage human lives, manage, the thing got to somewhere around the Amuwa, what's that place called, and crashed. Said he told his boss, are we reasonable? Who are we? Who are we? And we want to continue like this. All we want to do is, oh, to come to see my fleet of cars, my houses and all that stuff, forgetting that human life matters a lot. There are one million or one people there, out there, that can not even afford the meal. All the, I was coming now, I said, I was simple, do you know, sorry, I'm saying this, I'm being, I'm feeling somehow, I remain on the mainland, anytime I don't have anything because of traffic, I don't come this way. Today, when I got to Victoria Island and I saw the kinds of buildings you guys have, I've been feeling myself, I've been feeling, I told my children they should not come to, I'm fortunately, my children, I thought they won't come to Nigeria, they don't need to come and say anything because there's nothing to see. Now I know that I am Mr. Fulish. I can say categorically to Nigerian, I remain Mr. Fulish. What I saw today, the kind of buildings that I saw today, I remember at the point I raised up my head and I was counting floors and I was counting up to 30 floors and I said, me, I should just go and sleep somewhere. Hopefully, and of course I'm gonna wrap up with, saying that I hope that this is a wake up call for the Lagos State government to ensure that they look across all the approvals that have been given in the last five years for high rise buildings across Lagos because from what we've seen, it's possible to beat the system and continue building the people here. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you're right. So then they should include criminals, I mean, investigators. Absolutely. With this, yeah, with this panel, then we know that, yeah, we are at it. But if we say, okay, those who want to say, the sand was not too thick enough or the cement was not the proper one, here we go again. All right, that's where we will, of course, we'll end the discussion for now. Thank you for staying with us. Of course, as we've just been speaking with me, Baba Day is an international journalist. We'll take a short break and when we return, I'll be giving my take. My take today is centered around the value of the Nigerian life. This particular perspective has been spoken about millions of times, but we still don't seem to get it. When we start to actually place value on the Nigerian life, then we will begin to question certain levels of incompetence and stop ignoring the failures of government in areas that are always overlooked. Certain things we don't complain about and it's really because it's the Nigerian way and we don't know how to demand competence always. If we value the Nigerian life, we would speak louder about the things like the standard operating procedures for set and rescue Nigeria. On this day in 2012, it was on record that 63 people died from flooding in certain states in Nigeria. To date, no one was questioned and now we're doing the same thing with the set and rescue at Iqoi. Whose failure was responsible for the delay in equipment getting to Gerard Road? Are we using the right equipment in searching for survivors? Is the use of excavators alone best practice? Should there be any minute that passes where work is put on hold? And why don't we even have air lifting equipment? There's no helicopters. There's no helicopters at all. Nobody's asking these questions simply because there's no punishment for incompetence when it comes to the Nigerian life and we must do better. That's my take. Thanks for joining us. Plus, Politics Returns on a Monday at 7 p.m. I am Osao Gie, Oghbama. Have a great night.