Viral video of collapsed building at Ofankor not actual one – Ga North MCE

The Municipal Chief Executive (MCE) of Ga North in the Greater Accra Region, Simons Senkyim, has reacted to the viral video about a collapsed three-storey building.

A widespread video of the collapsed building on Friday, 22, 2023, is believed to have happened at Ofankor Market near Asofan.

However, Mr. Senkyim, admitted that though the unfortunate incident happened in the municipality the purported building in question is not the collapsed one.

“The reality is that there has been a collapsed building in Ga North truth of the matter is that the video making circulating is not that particular building that collapsed,” he said on the Angel Morning Show, Monday September 25.

According to the MCE the building in question situated at Ofankor Market near Asofan was under extension before its initial collapsed.

He discloses that the Assembly’s Engineering department had marked the building as a threat and planned to pull it down on September 27, but their pending action did not materialize until the heavy downpour on Friday forcibly cause the havoc.

“The building was under extension, but our engineers recently went and stopped them from carrying out their construction works because they cited as weak their used pillars so it can cause havoc therefore the engineer’s evacuated the caretaker in charge of the facility and marked it with a red ink with plans to demolish that building.

So, we proceeded to the Mile 7 police station and filed a formal complain of our planned decision which was scheduled this week but unfortunately the heavy downpour on the Friday brought the building down,” he accounted to Okatakyire Afrifa-Mensah.

He added that it was during the Assembly’s periodic checkup exercise on buildings that are under-construction before it came to light that the collapsed building was erected illegally without going through the required process.

“The building belongs to a Ghanaian living abroad but had handed over the facility to a caretaker so during the checkup routine, the engineers identified that they had no work permit.”

He noted though there was an inscription of ‘stop work, produce permit’ it was not from the assembly however he blamed the previous leadership of the assembly particularly the engineering department.

He concluded by assuring the general public that all accused persons identified to have one way of the other played some role in the incident due to their negligence would be made to face the law.