Officials in the Republic of Seychelles have cancelled a 2015 Africa Cup of Nations qualifier against Sierra Leone because of fears over the outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus in Sierra Leone.
Sierra Leone had beaten Seychelles 2-0 in the first leg last week in Sierra Leone and was due to honor the second leg this Saturday in Seychelles. This means Sierra Leone will be awarded an automatic place in the next stage of the qualifiers. The decision is yet to be confirmed by the Confederation of African Football (CAF).
The Sierra Leone football team was prevented from boarding a plane to the Seychelles after the team arrived in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi on Thursday.
Local reporters in Seychelles say the decision to stop Sierra Leone team from reaching the country was taken by immigration authorities in Seychelles who are concerned about the spread of the Ebola deadly virus.
The Republic of Seychelles is a 155-island country, spanning an archipelago in the Indian Ocean east of mainland Southeast Africa with a population of 84,000 according to the 2009 census in the country.
Sierra Leone has declared a state of emergency after a leading doctor treating Ebola patients died from the disease earlier this week. President of Sierra Leone, Ernest Bai Koroma has called on soldiers as part of the emergency measures to quarantine Ebola victims by force to prevent the disease from spreading.
Seychelles’ Football Association president, Elvis Chetty told the BBC African Sport that the decision to forfeit the match is painfully but there is nothing the Seychelles FA could do because the decision was taken from above.
“Looking purely from a football point of view, I am extremely disappointed about the situation. The country has been more excited about this match than it has been for a long time, I would like to state that the Seychelles FA lays no blame at the feet of the Sierra Leone FA for this, we have taken the decision because of the advice sent to us by the Seychelles Ministry of Health. “
“We also received a letter from the Ministry of Immigration saying it would not allow the Sierra Leone team to enter our jurisdiction, they are asking us to postpone the game for an indefinite period, so we feel it is right to forfeit now rather than drag it out”, he said.
Meanwhile, The World Health Organization has announced that it is launching a $100 million response plan to combat the Ebola outbreak.
The Presidents of affected West African nations met in the Guinean capital Conakry on Thursday with World Health Organization’s officials and the decision was taken to take the response to the disease to a new level.
The Ebola virus has killed 729 people out of 1,323 infected since February in West Africa. The disease was first detected in Guinea in early February this year.
The disease was said to have mainly spread because victims had come into direct contact with the affected persons.
Ebola is a deadly fever which causes an extremely severe disease in humans and in non-human primates in the form of viral hemorrhagic fever. Symptoms include diarrhea, vomiting, high fever, general weakness, organ failure and heavy bleeding.
Health experts say it is also a hemorrhagic fever made up of a group of illnesses that are caused by several distinct families of viruses which result in severe multi-system syndrome, affecting the multiple organ systems in the body and damaging the overall vascular system causing the body to stop regulating itself.
Issaka Adams / NationalTurk Africa News
Writer’s Email Address: Adamsisska@googlemail.com
[adrotate group=”14″]
