VIEWS OF CONSTRUCTION PROFESSIONALS’ ON THE CAUSES ANDREMEDIES OF BUILDING COLLAPSE IN NIGERIA

The collapse of building has been an issue of great concern to all and sundryin Nigeria and yet these buildings are major contributors to the developmentof any nation. Therefore, when a building collapses, it fails to render the func-tions which it should perform to the people and the government. A buildingis regarded as collapsed if the whole structure or part thereof has fallen downand therefore cannot serve the purpose for which it was intended. When build-ing collapses, it generates deep emotional reactions from every segment of thepopulation constituting great losses to the country in terms of physical, humanand material resources. Therefore, the aim of this research is to assess the opin-ion of construction professionals who are perceived as critical stakeholders onthe causes as well as to proffer remedies to curb the menace. The case study isOwerri municipal council, Imo State, Nigeria. A well-structured four-point Lik-ert Scale questionnaire was drawn and administered to 250 selected sampledrespondents to elicit data. Out of that the 250 respondents, 193 representing77% valid respondents were retrieved and utilized in the study analysis. Theanalysis revealed that all critical construction stakeholders were implicated ascontributors towards the incidences of building collapse. The study recom-mends among others that, Government, professionals' as well as other criticalstakeholders should adhere strictly to their statutory roles in order to curb themenace of building collapse in Nigeria.