17 Escape Death As Elevation Collapsed At Information Minister’s Office In Abuja

There was pandemonium Wednesday, when an averaged aged pregnant woman and sixteen others were trapped in an elevator at Radio house, Area 10 Abuja.

The victims, some of who are staff of the ministry of information were going on their normal day to day activity had cruised to the ninth floor of the building, when the elevator collapsed and banged the concrete basement.

 Some eye witnesses who spoke on the ground of anonymity said the lift collapsed when PHCN took light at about 10 am.

They said problem started when they could not found an experienced engineer to commence rescue operation immediately, as the whole building was in pandemonium for close to two hours trying to rescue the trapped victims from the lift.

It took the intervention of the men of the Federal Civil Service from Garki division to rescue the already dizzy pregnant woman and the sixteen other victims from dying of suffocation.

‘‘The elevated collapsed and trapped the seven people inside in the ground. After two hours they could not open it and some people suffocated.  They had to call the Federal Fire Service men to open the elevator before the pregnant woman and other people inside the lift could be rushed to Garki General Hospital.’’

‘‘They said the elevator collapsed because the power generating set could not power the lift but other elevators were still working then. I think, the elevator is faulty.  I know that this particular elevator had been closed for some time until last month when they opened it. For me that lift is faulty that is why it collapsed,’’ said an eye witnessed.

A staff of the ministry, who also spoke on the ground of anonymity blamed the elevator collapse on malfunctioning power generating set, he said that the ministry lacks good generating sets and some times has to depend on Radio Nigeria to power its facilities.

The twelve story building, which also houses the office of Federal Minister of Information, the Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria, FRCN, Voice of Nigeria and Kapital FM, has about six different lifts but an eye witness who also pleaded anonymity said that the collapsed lift had been dysfunctional for some months back until last months, when it was open for use, guessing that the said lift was faulty to have collapsed the way it did, even when the rest were still function.

When this reporter visited the scene of the incident, all the victims had already been evacuated to Garki General Hospital for treatment, and when he knocked at the office of the FRCN Director of News for clarification, the Director denied him attention.

One of the victims at the Garki General Hospital narrated their experience, ‘‘We entered the lift around 10:00 am and the lift went underground immediately after light went off, because the concrete surrounded the lift, we could not move nor see, we were crying, sweating, calling people to help before they open the door, and the breeze was coming in and after a while, we did not hear anything from anybody again. Every body was sweating again, dizzying for almost two hour, including the pregnant woman with us, who wanted to faint before they finally open the lift.

‘‘There was no lift operator there to guide us, I was palpitating and dizzying until they brought us to the Garki General Hospital and oxygen was administered on me.

‘‘As a staff of the ministry, I know there is a big power generating set there, I think they don t have people that specialise in operating the lift, that was why they could not rescue us immediately the incident happened and had to call the men of the Federal Fire Service to rescue us. It is God that saved us, we could have died. We didn’t even see any management till now, nobody has come to see how we are faring. We were brought here by the Fire Service men.’’

The victim who is a staff of the Ministry expressed worry over the attitude of the management of the Ministry for not careering for their well-being at the hospital.

‘‘The hospital said we are going to pay for our treatment, in fact I had to give them my NHIS number before they could treat me, are they not supposed to pay for the damage they have caused us?. At least I am a staff of the ministry. I can take it up because I am in union member. I would not know the step to take until when I recuperate and resume duty.

‘‘Usually, I don’t like climbing the stair case, I don’t know whether the lift was good or bad, just this morning I said let me follow them in the lift and the it collapsed,’’ she explained.