Two teenage survivors of a mysterious mass death incident at a South African nightclub on Sunday told Al Jazeera and Agence France-Presse (AFP) separately on Monday that they suspect staff at the venue sprayed an unidentified gas-like substance onto patrons of the overflowing bar, which may have contributed to the deaths of 21 minors.
Police in South Africa’s Eastern Cape province found 21 minors between the ages of 13 and 17 lying dead or unconscious at Enyobeni Tavern in the early morning hours of June 27. All 21 of the children ultimately died, with 17 passing away at the bar and another four dying on the way to the hospital.
The police officers said they reported to the tavern around 4:30 a.m. after receiving distress calls from inside the venue, which is located in Eastern Cape’s Scenery Park suburb. The cause of the children’s deaths remained unclear on June 28, as the victims displayed “no obvious signs of injury.”
Eastern Cape police officers said on Tuesday they would continue to investigate the incident over the coming days.
“[W]hen the nightclub became too overcrowded, people were asked to leave. When the partygoers did not comply, one of the security guards closed the door and began spraying a substance into the crowd,” a 17-year-old survivor of the incident referred to as Sinethemba — to protect her identity — told Al Jazeera on June 27.
“The man at the door, I think he was a bouncer, he closed the door and we couldn’t breathe. We suffocated for a long time and [were] pushing each other but there was no use because some people were dying,” she revealed.
“It smelled like gas. I’m not sure if it was tear gas or pepper spray. Then some people died and I also fell asleep for three hours. Then when they woke us up, they also thought I was dead,” Sinethemba continued.
After regaining consciousness, the teenager said one of her legs felt “numb” and that she required assistance to stand up.
Another survivor of the incident named Sinovuyo Monyane, 19, provided a similar account to AFP on June 27 in a telephone interview. Monyane said she was hired by Enyobeni Tavern to promote an alcohol brand on Saturday night. While at the nightclub in the early morning hours of Sunday, Monyane said she became stuck in a mass of people at the venue’s entrance due to overcrowding.
“We tried moving through the crowd, shouting ‘please let us through,’ and others were shouting ‘we are dying, guys,’ and ‘we are suffocating’ and ‘there are people who can’t breathe,'” she recounted to AFP.
“I passed out at that moment. I was running out of breath and there was a strong smell of some type of spray on in the air. We thought it was pepper spray,” Monyane said.
The young woman said she regained consciousness after a fellow patron sprinkled water on her.
“I got up and realized that there were bodies lying around. I saw people being poured water, but those people did not even move,” Monyane described.
“I could have died,” she said, adding that she “felt lucky to be alive.”
Thirty-one patrons of Enyobeni Tavern at the time of the mass death incident “were hospitalized with symptoms including backache, tight chests, vomiting and headache,” local officials told AFP on June 27.
“Most were discharged on Sunday, leaving two in hospital,” according to the officials.
South African news outlets, including DispatchLive, speculated on Sunday that the young victims at Enyobeni Tavern may have been “exposed to some form of poison.” The mass casualties likewise sparked an unproven theory that the minors may have suffered alcohol poisoning. The Eastern Cape Liquor Board (ECLB) ordered Enyobeni Tavern to close on Monday on the suspicion that the bar’s staff illegally served alcohol to minors over the weekend.
South Africa’s minimum drinking age is 18, though bars often illegally serve alcohol to minors across the country. Underage drinking is prevalent nationwide, according to the Southern Africa Alcohol Policy Alliance (SAAPA).
“In South Africa, 25% of young people under the age of 19 binge drinks and 12% of children under the age of 13 have had alcohol. […] South Africa has a high levels of alcohol consumption by global comparison [sic],” SAAPA reported in 2018.
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