The toll of the stampede in a stadium in Madagascar, Friday August 25, rose to thirteen dead, including seven minors, and a hundred injured, according to figures from the Red Cross and opposition deputy Hanitra Razafimanantsoa. According to the Red Cross, a dozen injured people are in serious condition and the toll could change.
The rescuers drew up a first list of the wounded. According to the document consulted by Agence France-Presse, the people who were taken care of are between the ages of 5 and 70. Among them, many teenagers.
A previous report, announced by the Prime Minister, Christian Ntsay, reported at least twelve people killed and around 80 others injured.
The crush occurred at the entrance to the Barea stadium in the capital, Antananarivo, where 50,000 spectators had come to watch the opening ceremony of the eleventh Games of the islands of the Indian Ocean. “There were a lot of people at the entrance, which triggered a stampede,” a stadium communications manager told Agence France-Presse.
moment of silence
The Malagasy President, Andry Rajoelina, present at the sports ceremony, called for a minute of silence. “We are about 50,000 present in the stadium,” said the head of state in a speech broadcast on television. But “a tragic event occurred, because there were stampedes. There were injuries and deaths at the entrance.”
Near the sports arena, some people were trying to find their shoes in a pile of objects probably lost in the crush, according to television images. Other images, from inside the stadium, broadcast on social networks, show the stands full to bursting.
The Indian Ocean Island Games are a multidisciplinary competition, held this year in Madagascar until September 3. They have taken place every four years, since 1979, in different islands in the southwest Indian Ocean.
The Barea stadium, the largest in this country of around 28 million inhabitants, had already been the scene of a similar incident in 2019. At least sixteen people had been killed and dozens of others injured during a concert organized on the occasion of the national holiday.
In 2016, the explosion of a homemade bomb on Independence Day left three dead and a hundred injured, still in the Barea stadium.
