In one of the bloodiest tragedies in football history, a stadium stampede that killed 131 people, including many children, on Tuesday was the subject of an investigation into elite Indonesian police officers.
Police moved to punish individuals responsible for the crush in Malang, which witnesses claim began when officers sprayed tear gas into crowded stands to stop a pitch invasion, as public outrage increased.
42,000 “Aremania,” or Arema FC supporters, filled the Kanjuruhan stadium’s terraces on Saturday night for a game against bitter rivals Persebaya Surabaya.
Fans flocked to the field to confront players and management following a 3-2 setback, their opponents’ first at home in more than 20 years.
The survivors charged the police with overreacting when they called the affair a riot and claimed two cops were killed.
More spectators entered the pitch as a result of the officers’ forceful response to the pitch invasion, which included kicking and beating spectators with batons, according to witnesses and video footage.
On Tuesday, the number of fatalities increased once further when local health official Wiyanto Wijoyo informed AFP that six additional victims had passed away from their wounds.
Witnesses reported seeing some of the stadium’s doors closed, and Indonesian officials said that 4,000 more tickets than were appropriate had been distributed for the game.
The most defenseless followers were left at the mercy of the crush as tear gas was sprayed down, while physically stronger supporters were able to scale massive fences to escape the chaos.
The calamity in the stadium, which was packed with only local Arema FC supporters, led to the replacement of the Malang police chief on Monday, the suspension of nine officers, and the investigation of 19 others, according to national police spokesman Dedi Prasetyo.
He claimed that those who had been suspended were members of the Mobile Brigade Corps, also known as Brimob, an organization that serves as the Indonesian police force’s paramilitary special operations unit and is renowned for its brutal crowd control methods.
The chairman of the organizing committee and a security guard of Arema FC were given lifetime football bans by Indonesia’s football association, and the club was fined 250 million rupiahs ($16,000) for the incident.
