A hotel under construction at the Idumoza Community, Uromi, Esan North East Local Government Area, collapsed and killed the owner, identified as Andrew Isesere.
Chronicle NG gathered on Sunday that the hotel building collapsed on Friday as over 20 workers at the site narrowly escaped death.
On Sunday morning, the deceased’s bodies were retrieved from the rubble.
According to an anonymous source, the incident shocked the neighbourhood, which mourned the loss of a potential investor.
The source said, “This is a sad occurrence, and it is painful that a young person had to die this way. The site workers were lucky, as 20 of them narrowly escaped death.
“The uncompleted hotel building collapsed on Friday, and the body of the deceased was pulled out on Sunday. It is so sad,“ the source added.
However, a neighbour, Andrew Inegbebor, stated the deceased was warned about the quality of materials used in the construction.
He further stated that there was no engineer on site to supervise the job because the deceased was always present to personally oversee the construction.
Inegbebor said, “The owner was told he was using low-quality materials. He used 12 mm instead of 16 mm rods for pillars. There was no base basket at the pillars. Look at the result.
“The building collapsed because of substandard materials that were used. There was no engineer on site. The deceased supervised the house. The house later collapsed and killed the owner, but the workers escaped.”
The Edo State police spokesman, Moses Yamu, stated that he had yet to get any briefing on the incident when our correspondent contacted him on Sunday evening.