AFCON stadium crush caused by ‘inexplicable’ gate closure – CAF president

The deadly crush outside a stadium at the Africa Cup of Nations in Cameroon was caused by an access gate being closed for “inexplicable reasons”, according to the president of the Confederation of African Football.

Patrice Motsepe has called for an immediate investigation into the disaster which saw a number of people killed and reportedly as many as 40 injured ahead of Cameroon’s last-16 tie with Comoros on Monday night.

Reports say fans were involved in a crush as they attempted to make their way into the 60,000-capacity Paul Biya Stadium in Olembe outside the Cameroon capital of Yaounde.

Motsepe pointed to an error with access in and around the stadium as the reason behind the incident.

“Some of the people came just to be part of the atmosphere,” he told a press conference. “Including those who didn’t have tickets, so I think we do accept that thousands of people more than what was expected did arrive.

“Having said that, we will have very tough and very hard discussions behind closed doors and I’m confident because of the discussions I had this morning.

“What happened yesterday in terms of the proximity of people being allowed to the stadium in a manner that is not properly coordinated and governed will never happen again.

If that gate was open as it was supposed to, we wouldn't have had this problem we have now, this loss of life.- Patrice Motsepe

“I went to see where the people lost their lives and you see it’s a gate. That gate was supposed to be open. Because if it was open, they would have walked through and it was closed for inexplicable reasons.

“If that gate was open as it was supposed to, we wouldn’t have had this problem we have now, this loss of life.

“So of course, as part of the hearing, we want to know