Zambia determined to win for crash victims

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ZAMBIA’S footballers, in a simple but deeply moving ceremony on Thursday, honoured their fallen compatriots who perished in the 1993 air crash off the coast of Gabon.

Shortly after arriving in Libreville, where they take on Ivory Coast in Sunday’s Africa Cup of Nations final, the Copper Bullets made their way to the spot where 500 metres offshore a Zambian Air Force flight ditched into the sea, wiping out the national squad.

The plane was en route to a 1994 World Cup qualifier against Senegal in Dakar and crashed.

All 30 people, 25 passengers and five crew, on board died.

An official inquiry found that pilot fatigue and an instrument error had contributed to the disaster which happened shortly after the plane refueled in Libreville.

Only former African Footballer of the Year Kalusha Bwalya avoided one of the great African football tragedies because he was based in the Netherlands with PSV Eindhoven and travelled directly to Dakar from Europe.

Bwalya, now president of the Zambian Football Federation, was among the group paying an emotional homage to the dead on a cloudy late afternoon.

Against the gentle sound of the Atlantic waves lapping against the beach he said, with tears in his eyes: “It is no coincidence that we are here today, we have worked hard as a team.

“However I am convinced that our dearly departed brothers who lost their lives here 19 years ago have lent us a helping hand.

“In 1993 the Copper Bullets came here to fulfill a promise, they did not succeed, but instead gave up their lives for a gallant cause.

“Their dream to bring glory to our country, mother Zambia, is the same cause that brings us here today, the only difference is that we are alive and our former teammates are no longer here.

“It is for this reason that I say here today on behalf of all of us involved in Zambian football that their dreams are our dreams, they are smiling down on heaven as we take part in this tournament in Gabon.

“I pray that their souls may forever rest in peace and that God will give us the strength and the courage to fulfil our dreams.... and theirs.”

A sign of how important this ceremony was to the 2012 squad was evidenced by the fact that not one player had the habitual set of headphones so beloved of football stars dangling around his ears, not one carried an ipod or iphone, each was simply intent on honouring the dead.