By Mark Baber
August 8 – A bomb blast at around 2:20am on Wednesday morning, following a football match in the Lyari district of Karachi, killed at least 11 fans, injuring many more, mostly children.
The bomb, which was planted on a motorcycle and set off by remote control, was loaded with ball bearings to target fans leaving the stadium, as well as a minister of the Sindh government who was at the game giving out prizes for the winners of the Ramadan tournament.
Residents of violence-wracked Karachi reacted with shock to the latest bombing, which has been condemned by Pakistan’s president, major political parties as well as the Pakistani Football Federation (PFF)
Naveed Haider, marketing director at PFF said “It’s tragic to note that eight football fans were killed in Lyari. Who knows whether there were potential players among them.”
Karachi has been plagued by violence as the borders between political parties, the police, criminal gangs and terrorist groups have become blurred. There were conflicting reports about whether the Sindh minister for Katchi Abadis (Shanty Towns) Javed Nagori was injured in the blast but his SUV was certainly damaged.
The match targeted was between Baba Ladla 99 and Baba Ladla 92, two teams both named after a powerful gang leader who in March was reported to have beheaded a chief rival and then used his head as a football.
Lyari is one of the hotbeds of football in Pakistan, with eight of Pakistan’s 16-man squad for the South Asian Youth Games coming from the area. But according to FIFA referee Ahmed Jan, speaking to AFP: “Football is dying. It died, maybe, for the last time on Tuesday. If the government fails to maintain law and order soon then I’m afraid this sport’s most loving part of the city will not be there on the sporting map.”
No-one has claimed responsibility for the attack but the likelihood is that it was orchestrated by opponents of Baba Ladla.
Jan hoped that the qualifiers for the Under-16 Asian Football Confederation, scheduled in Karachi in October, would still go ahead.
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