<div><span style="font-size: 1rem;"><b>The apartments they once industriously spent so long saving up for, decorating and making comfortable now lie in a heap of rubble after a violent quake hit Turkey.</b></span><br></div><div><br></div><div>New and old buildings, some constructed only six months ago, fell apart. Others flattened like concrete pancakes.</div><div><br></div><div>The full extent of the damage is unknown from Monday's 7.8-magnitude tremor and ceaseless aftershocks, which unleashed catastrophe in Turkey and Syria, killing more than 23,000 people.</div><div><br></div><div>Turkey's death toll rises every day. In parallel, so has fury over why, in a country with multiple fault lines and a history of major jolts, building quality is so poor that buildings fall apart like paper.</div><div><br></div><div>Experts say Turkey has the regulations in place to prevent such a catastrophe. But they are only applied loosely by construction companies, the largest of which are often close to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.</div><div><br></div><div>Officials say 12,141 buildings were either destroyed or seriously damaged in Turkey.</div><div><br></div><div>Since the first quake was so huge, "damage was to be expected, but not the type of damage that you are seeing now", said Mustafa Erdik, a professor at Istanbul-based Bogazici University.</div><div><br></div><div>Even if a building topples, people can usually hide until searchers can rescue them, he said.</div><div><br></div><div>But this time, he added, buildings suffered "a pancake collapse".</div><div>"The floors are piling on top of each other," Erdik, also part of the Turkish Earthquake Foundation said, which means the chances of being found alive are slim.</div><div><br></div><div>- Poor quality cement -</div><div><br></div><div>So why did the buildings topple?</div><div><br></div><div>The causes are usually linked to the poor quality of the concrete, which sometimes is mixed with too much water and gravel, and too little concrete, according to Zihni Tekin, a consultant at Istanbul Technical University.</div><div><br></div><div>Other reasons include steel rods that are too thin to support the columns, which limit the building's strength, the engineer said.</div><div><br></div><div>But Tekin also blamed engineers and architects' low quality of education, despite private universities appearing across Turkey.</div><div><br></div><div>Turkish officials have also gambled by easing regulations.</div><div><br></div><div>Turkey's rules on construction, based on California's, have been regularly revised since a 1999 tremor in northwestern Turkey.</div><div><br></div><div>The last revision came in 2018.</div><div><br></div><div>"On paper, standards are respected, with contracts entrusted to private companies in charge of checking them," Istanbul architect Aykut Koksal said.</div><div><br></div><div>But oversight of these agreements is lax, he added, giving builders greater leeway in following -- or not -- the rules.</div><div><br></div><div>- Fury over negligence, greed -</div><div><br></div><div>Heavy bureaucratic procedures also end up diluting who is responsible if or when something goes wrong, Erdik said.</div><div><br></div><div>"The steps and signatories are so many that at the end, it is difficult to identify who is responsible."</div><div><br></div><div>To fix this issue, he recommends imposing an insurance on all actors against malpractice that guarantees victims compensation by guilty contractors.</div><div><br></div><div>"That's how it is elsewhere in the world and it should be in Turkey," he said.</div><div><br></div><div>The clear negligence and greed shown by some contractors has sparked fury, especially after luxury flats built within the last 20 years crumbled like a pack of cards.</div><div><br></div><div>Many hope this quake will finally lead to better monitoring.</div><div><br></div><div>The first legal complaint was made on Friday in the southeastern province of Diyarbakir and others have followed.</div><div><br></div><div>- Erdogan's vow to rebuild -</div><div><br></div><div>What has particularly raised hackles is the importance Erdogan has placed on construction since his Justice and Development Party (AKP) came to power in 2002.</div><div><br></div><div>The boom in construction powered the substantial economic growth under Erdogan in the early years of his rule.</div><div><br></div><div>Official figures show the number of companies operating in the real estate sector increased by 43 percent in 10 years, reaching 127,000 before the coronavirus pandemic in 2020.</div><div><br></div><div>With Erdogan promising to rebuild the affected area within a year, the real estate frenzy is not likely to slow down.</div><div><br></div><div>Many speculate on the risk posed by high-rise buildings in Istanbul, which is anticipating its own passive jolt.</div><div><br></div><div>But for Erdik, the main concern is the "buildings with six, seven and eight floors built by small companies or even the families themselves".</div><div><br></div><div>He is not the only one fearful of lax building safety.</div><div><br></div><div>Since Monday, he has received never-ending calls from developers asking him to urgently assess their towers.</div><div><br></div><div>bnbd24/fas</div>