WORLD CUP DIFFERENCE LEADS TO DEATH

NAIROBI, Kenya, Jun 21 - An eighteen-year-old secondary school student was killed on Sunday night in Nairobi following a dispute over the World Cup match between Brazil and Ivory Coast.

Mr Lawrence Asava, a form three student at Kochland Secondary School was watching the match at a popular pub near the Nation Centre when he reportedly differed with his colleagues, leading to a scuffle which left him unconscious.

Three of his colleagues immediately carried him to a clinic on Muindi Mbingu Street but before they could get in, they realised that he was died, dropped him on the street and started running away but they were promptly arrested by taxi drivers who reported the incident to the police.

“Our officers were called to the scene where they found the young man lying in a handcart, the taxi drivers helped us a lot because they were able to arrest the boys for us,” Thomas Atuti, deputy police chief for Nairobi Central Police division said.

Mr Atuti said the clinic on Muindi Mbingu Street could not admit the boy because he was already dead. His body was taken to the city mortuary by the police as the two boys were escorted to the Central police station, less than 200 meters away.

“The report we have is that the boys were watching a [football] match in town and there was an argument after the results leading to a scuffle. We are yet to understand what exactly happened,” Mr Atuti said.

We could not immediately establish which team the boy was supporting.

When Capital News visited the boy’s father Kenneth Madala at their home in Lucky Summer estate, he told us he was not aware of his boy’s whereabouts.

He said he last saw him on Sunday and was equally worried when he failed to return home.

“I last saw him yesterday [Sunday] at about 3 or 4 pm. He looked like he was headed somewhere but I did not bother to find out because he is a grown up, but he did not come back,” Mr Madala who is a pastor at a local church in the estate said.

“I know he is a football fan but whenever he goes to watch football he usually comes back to go to school the following day. In fact, I even thought he came back and woke up early to go to school. I do not know where he is,” the father of five said as he pleaded to be told what had happened to his first born.

Worried of the outcome of breaking the sad news to the family, we directed them to the Central police division for further information. Our reporter offered to ferry him to the station where the news was broken to him.

CID Chief for Central police division Mr Festus Malinge said the two boys were being held for questioning over the incident “because no one has conclusively ascertained that they participated directly or indirectly in this killing.”

“We are still talking to them… the suspicion is arising from the fact that they were arrested while running away after abandoning their colleague outside the clinic,” he said. “They are the last people to have been seen with him, we are gathering all this information.”

Mr Malinge said he had also dispatched detectives to the pub where the boys were watching the football match “in order to recollect the scene and talk to witnesses.”

“We also looking for the handcart pusher who gave them the handcart, because he is a potential witness,” Mr Malinge said and added that they were getting “little information from workers and guards at the pub where the boys were drinking.”

In April last year, an Arsenal fan in Nairobi committed suicide after his team was eliminated from the Champions League by rivals Manchester United.