More than 100 people were feared dead in a soccer stadium stampede in Ghana's capital Accra on Wednesday night, state television and private radio said.
It was Africa's third soccer disaster in a month.
A state television official told Reuters the unconfirmed death toll was 120. A private radio broadcaster said he had counted more than 100 bodies in a hospital and a senior government official said he had seen 50 to 60.
"Where I am standing right now there are at least 50 to 60 bodies," Asamoah Boateng, a member of the presidency's chief of staff office in the West African country, told Reuters.
He was speaking by telephone from Accra's military hospital, where radio stations said many people killed or injured in the stampede had been taken.
Private radio Joy FM presenter Komla Dumor said he had personally counted more than 100 dead in one of the hospitals, while Choice FM radio gave no figure but said many people had been killed.
The stampede occurred at the end of a match between Hearts of Oak and their arch-rivals Kumasi Asante Kotoko at Accra's main stadium.
FANS THROW PLASTIC CHAIRS, POLICE FIRE TEARGAS
Joy FM said that with Hearts of Oak leading 2-1 five minutes before the final whistle, Kumasi Asante Kotoko fans began tearing up plastic stadium chairs and throwing chunks of them onto the pitch.
Police reacted by firing teargas into the crowd, triggering the stampede, the radio said.
Harry Zakour, chief executive of the Hearts of Oak team, told local Metro TV: "I think the police shot too much teargas. It was unnecessary."
The chief of staff of the state presidency, Jake Obetsebi-Lamptey, described the stampede as "a great tragedy".
Relatives were rushing to the hospital.
"It's important for people to stay calm because relations and friends of the injured and the dead are preventing doctors from working," Obetsebi-Lamptey told Joy FM, adding that an investigation would be launched.
On April 11, 43 soccer fans were crushed to death when soccer fans tried to force their way into Johannesburg's huge Ellis Park midway through a top South African league match.
At least seven people were killed and 51 seriously injured in an April 30 stampede in the Democratic Republic of Congo after police moved to break up rioting at a match in Lubumbashi.
Deadly soccer violence has struck Africa repeatedly over the past decade.
Thirteen people died in a stampede after rioting in a World Cup qualifier between Zimbabwe and South Africa. Zimbabwean police, who fired teargas during the match, later accepted some blame for the deaths.
In 1996, at least seven people were killed during a stampede at a Zambia-Sudan World Cup qualifiers' match in Lusaka.
Forty people died outside Johannesburg in 1991 after being crushed against a stadium fence, trampled underfoot or stabbed as thousands of fans surged towards a jammed exit to escape rival brawling spectators.
(China Daily 05/10/2001)
