City officials in the Nigerian Capital of Lagos have told reporters that, at least, seven people have been killed and dozen others left injured after a residential building collapsed in a poor neighborhood in the city centre.

The three –storey building located on 29b Oloto St, off Cemetery Road collapsed, killing no fewer than seven people.

Seven other people were reported to have been rescued from the disaster including a baby and were in hospital for medical attention. Some are in critical condition.

Officials say preliminary investigations have revealed that the building caved in because of structural defects which were left unattended to for quite a long time by the building owner.

The Nigerian Red Cross say rescue operations were continuing as they suspected that more people might be trapped under the building.

An eyewitness told the Nigerian Leadership Newspaper that she was on the balcony of the second floor when the building came down on its own.

“I am happy because my mother and, brothers and sisters are alive. We all survived it. They have been taken to hospital for treatment. We did not know that the building will collapse. By about 2:00 a.m. when the building collapsed, some of our co-tenants were trapped, while some were dead.

“We have been noticing cracks in the walls of our rooms, but my father used to patch these up with cement. We have paid the landlord money upfront and he will not refund the rent to us again. So we were still leaving in the building,’’ She told the Newspaper.

Lagos is one of the most overcrowded cities in Africa, with many badly built structures and poor safety standards making some of these disasters unavoidable.

Issaka Adams / NationalTurk Africa News