BBC Thursday, 10 May, 2001, 08:39 GMT 09:39 UK

Ghana mourns after football tragedy

Police over-reaction is being blamed for what is thought to be the worst tragedy in African sporting history - the deaths of at least 120 fans at a football match in the Ghanaian capital.

Ghana's President John Kufuor has called an emergency cabinet meeting and a national state of mourning is expected to be declared.

Relatives are travelling to the scene of the disaster and to local hospitals to find their loved ones.

Witnesses blame police for triggering a fatal stampede by firing teargas in an attempt to quell violence at the game between the country's two top clubs, Hearts of Oak and Asante Kotoko.

The tragedy at the Accra Sports stadium is thought to be the worst in African sporting history, and was the fourth incident of its kind in Africa in less than a month.

The game had about five minutes left when Kotoko fans - whose team were losing 2-1 - started ripping off chairs from one stand and hurling them onto the pitch.

Police used teargas in an effort to control the crowd, but this appears to have created panic and led to a stampede.

Ghana's deputy sports minister Joe Aggrey told the BBC that up to 124 football fans were killed in the ensuing rush.

The gates to the 40,000 capacity ground were reportedly locked shut.

Dead young men

"I saw young men, young virile men, lying dead on the floor. I'm devastated. I couldn't count (the dead,)" said Mr Aggrey.

Referring to the action taken by the police, he said: "From the information that I have, I think the lack of control - and I don't want to prejudge the situation but - I think that it was the teargas that caused the problem."

The Chief Executive of Hearts of Oak, Harry Zakour also condemned the police for firing up to a dozen teargas canisters.

"One would have been enough to scare the public ... it's a very sad story," he said.

President Kufuor, his vice president and other cabinet ministers spent much of Wednesday evening visiting the four main hospitals where the victims had been taken.

"Some died of suffocation, but the majority seem to have been killed by being crushed," said Brigadier Daniel Twum of the Thirty-Seven Military Hospital where most of the dead and injured were taken after the stampede.

Trouble had been anticipated ahead of the game, and the authorities had taken extra security measures to prevent the disaster.

The latest football tragedy follows three similar disasters in South Africa, DR Congo and the Ivory Coast, in the last month.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001