By Enyichukwu Enemanna
No fewer than six job seekers were on Wednesday reported dead during a stampede at a military recruitment exercise in a stadium, in the West African nation of Ghana.
According to a statement from Ghana’s armed forces, the “tragic” crush appeared to have been caused by an “an unexpected surge of applicants who breached security protocols and rushed into the gates”.
Thousands applicants had turned up to El-Wak stadium, in the capital, Accra, hoping to serve the country as military officers.
The West African cocoa and gold-rich country has a youth unemployment rate of about 13%. Like its neighbours, such recruitment exercise usually has a large turn out of young people seeking to be gainfully employed.
The deadline to apply for this event was extended by a week to accommodate more applicants, as some had experienced hitches in submitting their applications.
Several were also injured and are receiving currently receiving medical treatment.
Army spokesperson Capt Veronica Adzo Arhin said the crush occurred ahead of the event’s scheduled start of 06:20 GMT.
In the neighbouring Nigeria, the Civil Defence, Correctional, Fire and Immigration Services Board (CDCFIB) in August received a total of 1,911,692 applications for just 30,000 vacancies across the four paramilitary agencies under its supervision, highlighting the increasing rate of youth unemployment in the region.
