Residents threaten protest as construction site collapses, kills one in Akwa Ibom

Angry residents of Urua Ekpa community in the Itu Local Government Area of Akwa Ibom State have started mobilising for a mass protest in connection with the death of one Marvelous, a construction worker buried under a collapsed underground drainage system at the weekend.

It was gathered that human error caused the accident, coupled with a poor rescue operation, as the community youths were said to have deployed manual efforts with shovels, as the company in charge of the construction could not immediately bring an excavator.

Speaking to our correspondent, Mfon Udo, a resident of the area, who said he assisted in the rescue operation, lamented, “the victim could have been rescued alive, but for lack of earth-moving equipment like excavator, which forced us to join in digging the spot for over four hours to get at his remains, heavily pressed down in the rubble.”

He explained that “the structure collapsed under the weight and vibration of a motorized equipment that was packing and ferrying the chipping stones closer to the underground, where the victim, a mason man, was trapped, while trying to pour the cement and concrete mixture in the construction of the underground water tunnel.”

He expressed worry that “a job of this magnitude could be awarded to a local contractor as a political compensation” to the firm allegedly owned by Elder Benji Udobia, the political leader of Esit Eket Local Government Area, and urged Governor Udom Emmanuel to cancel the contract and re-award it to a major company with excellent safety standards as his tenure nears its May 29, 2023 exit date.

“We have been completely cut-off from Uyo, the state capital, because of perennial floods that submerged houses and people losing their lives every rainy season. So, when we saw contractors being mobilized to the site, we commended the governor for this rescue mission, but it turned out to be a big disaster to the people.”, Effiong Bassey, a youths’ activist from the Itu LGA, lamented.

Checks by our correspondent yesterday revealed that the contractor had abandoned the job following a threat by the angry community youths to launch a protest against alleged neglect, leading to the sad incident.

“Since the accident happened, the contractor has disappeared with their equipment from the site, and from the look of things, the job has been abandoned because the administration is already getting closer to its end of tenure in 2023.”, Emmanuel Akpan’, a resident said.

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