Yesterday marked the 2nd anniversary of the tragic FNB Stadium stampede which claimed the lives of two people, on 29 July 2017.
Yet, the public and the loved ones of those who lost their lives still do not have any answers as to what led to the events which claimed two lives and left several injured.
What’s worse, in March last year, former Sport and Recreation Minister, Tokozile Xasa, called off an inquiry into the stampede. The reasons behind the scrapping of the inquiry is still unknown and the Democratic Alliance still has several questions whether the former minister was pressured into the decision by ANC members or the Premier Soccer League leadership.
There are still too many questions surrounding the incident and it is frankly unethical that a probe into how two innocent people died, has seemingly been muffled.
The South African public deserves to know the truth and most important, the families of the victims deserve closure. Major crowd-control catastrophes at our stadiums must each be interrogated to ensure that they do not happen again in future. In this case, the ANC government is preventing life-saving lessons from being learned.
The DA calls on Sports and Recreation Minister, Nathi Mthethwa, to re-institute an inquiry into the FNB Stadium stampede in order for the country to understand what led to the stampede so that a tragic event like this never happens again.
A probe of this nature will not only bring much-needed closure, but it will go a long way in ensuring the improvement in the safety and security of our stadiums.