The Director General of the Lagos State Safety Commission, Lanre Mojola, says the failure of organisers to put adequate safety measures in place was the root cause of the stampedes that claimed dozens of lives across the country.
Speaking on Jasiri on Tuesday, Mojola noted that it is very clear that there were organisational failures, especially with crowd safety and control and with the benefit of hindsight, those behind the event would have done things differently.
“From those videos, watching those videos, it was very clear that there was a lot of incompetence on the side of some of the organisers. We understand that they’re trying to help, but whilst trying to help, the duty of care is also on you to ensure you’re doing it in an absolutely safe manner.”
” Have you planned well for the event? Have you done your risk assessment? Have you done all your mitigations? Have you identified all the possible hazards? If these hazards then crystallise, you swing into recovery and response. What are the plans to ensure that things just don’t fall apart? A lot of these failures were clearly seen.” Mojola said.
He commiserated with the bereaved, stressing that it is very important that organisers ensure they stick to the maximum capacity of a facility to prevent any future re-occurrence.
