Port Harcourt — Tragedy struck Wednesday night in Ogbo, Ahoada, Rivers State, when a bus driver, said to be a fan of Manchester United Football Club, rammed his bus into the jubilant Barcelona fans crowd and killed four persons.
It was another tale of tragedy as a two-passenger aircraft belonging to Nigeria Air Force (NAF) crashed yesterday in Kaduna, killing a Group Captain and a Flying Officer.
The Man United fan was allegedly miffed seeing Barcelona fans celebrating their club’s 2-0 victory over Manchester United in the final of the European Champions League played in Rome, Italy. He was said to have also injured 12 persons.
Confirming the incident, Police spokesperson in Rivers State, Mrs. Rita Inoma-Abbey, said the culprit, named Daniel Uzor, had been arrested and was being investigated for the alleged offence.
“The man confessed to doing it on purpose,” Abbey. “He now says he doesn’t know why he did it, but it was an intentional act.”
This is the third similar incident in the state in recent times. The first was when a student shot a colleague who taunted him over the defeat of his favourite team while a second one was stabbed to death over similar issues surrounding English club sides.
Uzor was alleged to have been returning from where he went to watch the UEFA Champions League final when he saw a crowd of youths celebrating the victory of their favourite team and apparently angered by that, he rammed his bus into them at high speed. However, a witness gave a more graphic account of the accident.
“We were all angered by the loss of our team. You cannot imagine Barcelona beating
Manchester United. The bus driver came by and shouted at them (the jubilant Barcelona fans). Some of the youths replied him and before we knew what was happening, he made a U-turn and rammed into them,” he said.
He said that the crunching of bones and the crushing of the fans resulted into a large bang that reverberated round the community while the injured cried for help as no one expected the reaction of the driver.
In Lagos two years ago, an Arsenal Football Club fan had a knife stab in his skull after an argument with another fan who had an argument with the Arsenal supporter that Bolton Football Club would beat his team.
Last month, an Arsenal in Kenya committed suicide after his team had been eliminated from the Champions League by Manchester United.
In Kaduna inicident, the aircraft which is known as Air Beetle is a training airplane which is regularly used by the NAF and it crashed during training in a place located between Jaji and Kachia.
At press time the reason for the crash was not known.
This is the first air crash in Nigeria this year. Since 2006 there has not been any major air accident in Nigeria.{linkr:related;keywords:sport;limit:5;title:Related Articles}
