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By Sunday Ani
Concerned stakeholders of the National Theatre have called for investigation into the Friday, December 29, 2023, gas explosion at the National Theatre in Lagos.
According to the group, the explosion which led to the destruction of valuables was due to the illegal transloading of refined petroleum products and LPG within the National Theatre premises.
Reiterating his call for a thorough and an unbiased investigation into the explosion and the illegal transloading operations on the CBAAC land, Spokesman of the group, Olalekan Ayinde, urged President Bola Tinubu and the Minister for Arts, Culture and Creative Economy, Hajia Hannatu Musawa to set up a probe panel to remote the circumstance that led to the explosion.
Ayinde blamed the Prof Sunday Ododo led National Theatre management for the explosion while also criticising the General Manager for leasing out the land for illegal petroleum and LPG transloading without carrying out risk assessment and obtaining the approval of the board and management of the parastatal.
He said, “The explosion is avoidable. It was as a result of the recklessness and corruption of the management. They leased out the portion of land illegal without following due process and not consideration the risk involved in the business.
“Prof Sunday Ododo didn’t obtain board and management approval before granting the land to the lessee.
If not for the negligence of the management, the explosion was avoidable because there was a report on the illegal activities of the lessee before the General Manager which he ignored.
“I am aware that there was an existing report of activities within the parastatal dated September 25, 2023, which cautioned the management on the hazard involved in leasing the land out for illegal transloading operations. The report was issued by one Engineer Usman Habib having closely observed the activities of the lessee.
“The report documented that there were on-going construction works taking place at the Entrance ‘C’ gate, the lawns and the piling works opposite the Entrance ‘B’ gate. In the report, the author claimed to have observed that the illegal and dangerous activities were still taking place at the former CBAAC land near the artists’ village which he had earlier notified the authorities as far back as the second quarter of year 2022 about the transloading of refined petroleum products from the trucks into jerry cans and drums and also LPG from the trucks into coking cylinder of different sizes. This has continued despite the hazard involved. But nothing came out of the report which ought to have put a stop to the illegal transloading activities
“We, the Concerned Stakeholders, are therefore bothered about the safety of workers within the National Theatre and importantly those that work directly at the site of the explosion. We are therefore calling on the Federal Government and the supervising ministry to fish out those that are behind the illegal transloading operation and also probe deep into the finances and activities of the managers of the parastatal. This is necessary to prevent a recurrence of such dangerous explosion. A security operative manning the Entrance C gate of the parastatal who craved anonymity disclosed that there are load of shadowy activities going on within the parastatal.”
He described the operation of transloading of petroleum and LPG by the lessee as illegal while alleging that their operations are aided by the management of the parastatatal.
