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The second leg of the second round of qualifying for the Under-23 African Cup of Nations between Algeria and the Democratic Republic of Congo did not hold up on Saturday (October 29th). In question: a failure of the plane which was to take the young Leopards to Algeria.
More fear than harm, but a catastrophe may well have been avoided on Saturday. The players of the Congolese under-23 selection thought of going to Sétif, in Algeria, with a certain serenity. After their victory in Kinshasa on October 23, in the first leg of the second qualifying round for the next CAN U23 (4-1), they were confident. But far from the green meadow, it was in the air that the Leopards experienced a very distressing episode.
The plane carrying coach Raoul Shungu and his men never reached Algeria, where the match was to be held at 5 p.m. UT. The aircraft chartered by Air Kasaï broke down after several hours of flight. A technical problem that prompted the pilot to turn around and land urgently at Ndjili airport in Kinshasa.
« It’s a great miracle »
The crash was narrowly avoided. Sébastien Desabre, the coach of the DRC A team, was present. John Bakata, striker of the DRC selection, was also on board the plane. He confided in this big fright at the microphone of Pascal MangwalaRFI journalist:
« Truly, it is a great miracle. We shouldn’t be alive today. Me, I was in full sleep when the breakdown occurred. I was next to a window and when we landed in Kinshasa I saw all the ambulances arriving. There, we said with my teammates “our adventure ends there”. Each of us was in his thoughts. We had no more hopes. Me, I thought of 1,000 things in a single minute. »
The Algeria-DRC match was logically postponed for 24 hours. The Congolese finally took another plane from the Congo Airways company during the night. ” Now, I hope that event is behind us. We are again focused on our objective: to qualify and please the country ,” added John Bakata.
