Africa's worst stadium disaster

On 9 May 2001, 127 people died and dozens more were injured at the Accra Stadium in Ghana. It is Africa's worst football stadium tragedy. The disaster happened at the end of a match between Asante Kotoko and Hearts of Oak. Police fired tear gas after angry fans threw chairs onto the pitch. It caused a stampede. Herbert Mensah was the Asante Kotoko chairman at the time and speaks to Jen Dale about his recollections of that day. This programme contains distressing details. Eye-witness accounts brought to life by archive. Witness History is for those fascinated by and curious about the past. We take you to the events that have shaped our world through the eyes of the people who were there. For nine minutes every day, we take you back in time and all over the world, to examine wars, coups, scientific discoveries, cultural moments and much more. Recent episodes explore everything from how the Excel spreadsheet was developed, the creation of cartoon rabbit Miffy and how the sound barrier was broken. We look at the lives of some of the most famous leaders, artists, scientists and personalities in history, including: the moment Reagan and Gorbachev met in Geneva, Haitian singer Emerante de Pradines’ life and Omar Sharif’s legendary movie entrance in Lawrence of Arabia. You can learn all about fascinating and surprising stories, like the invention of a stent which has saved lives around the world; the birth of the G7; and the meeting of Maldives’ ministers underwater. We cover everything from World War Two and Cold War stories to Black History Month and our journeys into space. (Photo: Residents look at the empty Accra stadium after the stampede. Credit: Photo by Issouf Sanogo/AFP via Getty Images)

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Africa's worst stadium disaster is an episode from Witness by BBC.

This episode is 10:45 long.

This episode was published on May 7, 2026.

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