Six people, including a child, are missing after a six-storey building under construction collapsed in a suburb of the Guinean capital Conakry, local sources told AFP on Tuesday.
The building collapsed late Monday afternoon. “Five workers and a child lie under the rubble,” said a community official and a worker on site.
The building was in a quiet area of the city of Matoto (south of Conakry), among other residential and office buildings, noted an AFP correspondent who visited the site.
An impressive police and gendarmerie security system was deployed at the scene, with civil defense officers and rescuers trying to find any survivors beneath the rubble.
“This building was part of the public housing project launched by the Guinean government to house public sector workers,” the local elected official said.
“The workers had already completed the fifth slab and were beginning to build the sixth when everything collapsed. None of the victims are currently responding to the rescuers’ calls. But we still hope to work a miracle by rescuing some workers trapped under the rubble,” said a worker working at the site.
The construction work was carried out by the company MAK BTP, which is responsible for the construction of social housing in this suburb of Conakry.
Many construction companies have been set up in Guinea in recent years by relatives of high-ranking public officials. Every year, buildings under construction collapse in Conakry.
In particular, the sector suffers from a lack of control of the works by departments of the Ministry of Urban Planning and Housing, and some property owners are suspected of corruption.