Father kisses daughter who died in stadium crash goodbye at Indonesian cemetery

Malang: An Indonesian father, Mochamad Munif, looked at the grave of his little daughter, sprinkled petals on it, then bent down to kiss a square white stone slab and uttered words he never wanted to say.

“If you have wronged me or your father, I forgive you.

Munif, like many others who have lost loved ones, weekend stadium stampedecould not understand how his 20-year-old daughter went to her first soccer match and came back dead.

Lutvia Damayanti was involved in an overcrowded match at Malang on Saturday, but fell into tragedy when police tried to quell an invasion of the pitch by firing tear gas into the packed stands. closed exit.

at least 131 people including 32 children died Hundreds more were injured in one of the worst disasters in football history.

The family does not yet know the circumstances of her daughter’s death, whether she died instantly or in hospital, but Munif said: blame the police.

“Why do we have to fire (tear gas) at the stands?” he asked. “Even though supporters like my daughter weren’t at fault?”

Many were suffocated as they were pushed up through the closed gates, twisted by the force of the crowd. Munif said there were no signs of trauma on her daughter’s face.

While he was renovating his home in the East Java city of Surabaya, a colleague told him that a deadly stampede had occurred at his hometown of Kanjurhan Stadium, a two-hour drive away. Then he got the phone call that every parent fears.

His daughter took an ambulance to his parents’ house in Malang, his brother told him over the phone.

“If she had been in the ambulance, I knew she would have already died,” the 47-year-old told AFP, describing the moment that changed his life forever.

He can’t remember the trip home in a blur of grief.

When he arrived to find her body lying on the floor and pulled the sheets back to expose her face, he passed out.