International Journal of Sub-Saharan African Research (IJSSAR)

Background: The frightening upsurge in building collapse across Nigeria has become a crucial national issue. With 135 incidents and at least 26 tragic deaths recorded between 2022 and 2024. Building collapse in Nigeria in the last few decades is a developing worry for investors and the government alike. Newspapers and other printed publications use disaster photos to show people the depth of calamity and devastation. A typical case where photographs were deployed in the depiction of disaster in the Nigerian print media came with the Ikoyi collapsed building, where more than 40 people were killed. Images in those photographs included the gory sight of dead bodies, spills of blood, and injured survivors trapped under the rubble. The implication of this ubiquity of photographic representation of the building collapse incident is that Nigerian newspaper readers would have been exposed to them; their knowledge and impression of that incident would, to a larger or lesser extent, have been shaped by the photographs.
Objective: The study investigated Lagos readers' perception of the photographic representation of the 2021 Ikoyi collapsed building in select Nigerian newspapers.
Method: A descriptive survey research method was adopted. The questionnaire served as an instrument for data collection. Generated data were analysed using the percentage method.
Result: Findings show that a greater number of the respondents were exposed to newspaper photographs/pictures of the November 1st Ikoyi collapsed building published in the newspapers in Nigeria. Further findings showed that the majority of the respondents perceived the photographic representation of the Ikoyi building collapse in the newspapers as sensational and in bad taste.
Conclusion: There was negative perception newspaper photographs/pictures of the November 1st Ikoyi collapsed building among respondents.
Unique contribution: The study contributes insights into the causes of building collapse in Nigeria. It is hoped that both government and engineering regulators as well the media who frame contents would benefit from the study. It also contributes literature on building collapse in Nigeria, which has become prevalent.
Key recommendation: Based on this, the study recommends that the Nigerian Union of Journalists should prevail on newspaper editors to avoid the use of graphic/obscene or horrible pictures in their news reportage even when it is used, they should be cautious about it.