Pregnant woman, three children, many others feared dead in Port Harcourt stampede

Over 39 persons are feared dead with many wounded following a stampede at the Polo Club in Port Harcourt on Saturday morning.

The sad incident occurred during a free shopping programme organised by Kings Assemblies Church in the Rivers State capital.

The programme was organised to help the underprivileged get gifts including food items free of charge.

As at the time of filling this report, over 39 dead bodies were reported to have been counted including a pregnant lady and three children.

The ugly incident has been blamed on poor crowd management of the organisers and impatience on the part of the recipients where everyone was in a rush to get ahead of others.

As at the time of this report, some of the organisers of the programme have been arrested including the Church Legal Adviser whose name was not given.

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A mobile policeman was also disarmed by the Olu-obasanjo Police Station as it was discovered that the officer was on “illegal” duty.

A member of the church who witnessed the incident confirmed the death figure but blamed the event on the impatience of majority of people in the crowd.

Another eyewitness said thousands of people gathered at the venue as early as 2.000am and were trying to force their way into the premises resulting in a stampede and deaths.

She said: “A nursing mother with her newborn baby of about four months were victims. I had to leave the event when I saw the increasing number of people rushing to get things free. There was no crowd control. Ambulances, policemen and other security agencies have been rushing the injured and evacuating the dead bodies at the scene.”

Efforts to get the position of the Rivers State Police command on the incident could not immediately yield result as the acting spokesperson of the command, Grace Iringe-Koko, neither answered phone calls nor responded to WhatsApp messages sent by our correspondent.