Port Harcourt deaths: How can we turn something so beautiful into something so ugly

Port Harcourt deaths: How can we turn something so beautiful into something so ugly

Sunday, May 29, 2022 6:00 pm


 

Venue of the stampede and deaths

By Lara Owoeye-Wise

My heart goes out to the families of those who lost their lives in the early morning stampede in Portharcourt.

This was a totally avoidable disaster.

Reverend Chris Ugo holds this annual “shop for free” event in his church. It is a programme where the poor come to a venue and pick food and household items for free.
Such a noble gesture.

This year as with previous years, the venue was set and beautiful arranged for royalty. That is how I suppose the organizers viewed the beneficiaries of his humanitarian gesture. Just take a look at pictures 1 and 2.

Event was supposed to start by 9am.
Reports have it that people started thronging there from midnight. Some literally camped there, for an event whose venue was still under lock!

By dawn, the crowd had grown beyond mammoth and a stampede broke out long before the organizers and volunteers got to the venue!

The crowd pulled down the gate which was locked and then marched over the vulnerable and the fallen!

How can we turn something so beautiful into something so ugly! How?

As at the last count, 31 souls lost just like that!

It beats me. It truly beats me.
May the souls of the departed find rest. My heart goes out to the bereaved.


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