By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
The Garden Route District Municipality has now confirmed that the death toll climbed to 16 after another person died in the early hours of Sunday.
According to the municipality, 44 people have been pulled from the rubble, with 16 dead, 14 in hospital and 37 unaccounted for.
Eighty-one people were at the site when the building collapsed on Monday at about 2pm.
“The Joint District Operations Centre adheres to a stringent double verification protocol to ensure the accuracy of the reported numbers.
“This is done in close collaboration with recovery teams, hospitals, and forensic services,” the municipality said.
As rescue operations enters the 124th hour at 18:00 on 11 May 2024, rescue efforts intensifies with renewed vigor at the collapsed building site, 75 Victoria Street.
This is attributed to the successful rescue of Gabriel Guambe.
Guambe is currently hospitalised in a stable condition and has been in communication with his family.
SAPS Warrant Officer Willie Visser with his sniffer dog, Abbey, led the teams on site to the survivor on Saturday morning.
The much-needed lead was confirmed by another SAPS sniffer dog, Lex with handler, Warrant Officer Riaan Le Roux.
The SAPS sniffer dogs and handlers have been on scene since the tragedy occurred as part of the ongoing multidisciplinary search, rescue and recovery operation which commenced Monday afternoon.
Executive Mayor, Leon van Wyk expressed his appreciation for the work done by the emergency teams so far.
He commended rescue workers and all involved stakeholders, organisations, the media, and the public stating that their efforts, along with the state-of-the-art equipment brought in, have resulted in a world-class rescue effort.
The company that owns the land where the five-storey building collapsed has distanced itself from employing construction workers at the site.
Neo Victoria Developments (Pty) Ltd, released a statement via their attorney, Hanno Brummer & Associates to ‘clear up misunderstandings and incorrect information’.
The law firm stated that its client is the developer of the building project and not the building contractor. They clarified that the contractor was appointed by their client to oversee the construction of the five-storey building.
The statement further said the developers had no employees on the site and the construction workers have either been employed by contractors or sub-contractors.
It further said the developer, Neo Victor Developments, is assisting police in their investigation and has offered its assistance since day one.
George Municipality said on September 3, 2020, a pre-application form for the proposed development was submitted to the George Municipality’s Town Planning Department by Jan Vrolijk Town Planner, acting on behalf of the owners of land.
The building plan application was approved on July 6, 2023, and issued to the applicant.
“The outcome for approval follows two prior outcomes not to approve the building plan based on details required regarding services and outstanding contributions. The plans were only approved once the Building Control Officer (BCO) was satisfied that the requirements were met,” George Municipality spokesperson, Chantel Edwards said.
The development was estimated at over R39 million.
The value of the development was estimated at R39,544,000 at the time of approval. The development consisted of a basement parking area, ground-floor parking, and four floors of residential apartments above the parking. There are 42 apartments proposed and approved on the building plans. The area of the site is 1,228 square meters, and the total area of the development is 4,943 square meters with a coverage of 877.4 square meters (71.45%),” Edwards said.
At the time, construction at the site progressed and included the concrete roof with various other disciplines busy with service installations.
“The municipality has no record of previous safety violations by the developer within the George municipal area,” Edwards said.
She further also explained compliance during construction.
“The developer with his professional team is not obliged to submit any compliance report to the municipality. The normal practise is that the owner and developer, together with their professional team will have weekly/bi-weekly, or monthly meetings and inspections where progress reports are submitted to the owner/client.
“This practice is done with no input from the municipality and the current applicable legislation does not demand that this information is submitted to the municipality,” Edwards said.