Vladislavs Podgurskis, a representative of Vikom Industry, said in response that all metal components were made and assembled strictly according to the building design and that it must be a design error. Vikom Industry said the bolts for joining the trusses had been supplied by the Eurobolts company. On 25 November Vikom Industry requested a manufacturer's certificate from Eurobolts for a certain batch of bolts. The owner and CEO of Eurobolts, Olga Romanova, said that the company has no information on what the bolts they sell are used for, however, the bolts in the batch Vikom Industry was interested in were not strong enough for joining trusses for the roof and that Vikom Industry had in fact never bought bolts that would be strong enough for that purpose. She added that judging from photographs of the trusses on the scene of the incident even smaller bolts were used. An anonymous fireman told TV3 News that the bolts he had seen on scene had not been broken, rather pulled out from fastenings, indicating the bolts were not designed for bearing the weight of the roof. The vice director of the Latvian Fire Safety and Civil Defence College, Vilis Students, who participated in the rescue work, said that the concrete components seemed unexpectedly fragile. Translated quote: ""I am no specialist, but we could break the roof components with hammers and pliers. During exercises with concrete objects, we usually had to use a jackhammer."" According to Maxima staff, the building had been dangerously unstable for about a year. The construction workers had told them that the foundation was cracked and needed reinforcement. At one point the storage room and store workers' locker room was completely flooded. There had also been extra support columns under the ceiling of the storage room, but those had been removed later. The fire alarm sounded frequently. The staff believe that the reason for the alarm was that it was obsolete and could not distinguish smoke from dust. The workers did not want to testify about this in front of a camera because they feared for their jobs. On 23 November, Latvian President Andris Bērziņš stated that the collapse was a "murder of defenseless people" and that the "perpetrators should be arrested", and that the inquiry needed independent experts from other countries who are not associated with Latvian builders in any possible way. He also said that the entire political system needs to be changed as it allows individuals to escape responsibility. The BBC News Riga correspondent reported that the president wanted a criminal investigation "led by independent investigators from abroad – implying that powerful business interests in Latvia are too closely entwined with politics to ensure a fair and honest investigation."