Family and friends of Baptista Adjei, a 15-year-old Ghanaian footballer who was stabbed at Stratford Broadway, East London converged to bid their final goodbyes at his funeral.
A video sighted by www.ghanaweb.com captures the mother of young Baptista inconsolable as a hearse designed with his club’s wreath conveyed his remains.
Madam Josephine Adjei, together with other mourners, is seen weeping uncontrollably at the yard.
Baptista Adjei was on the verge of joining League One side, Ipswich Town before his untimely death.
Background
Baptista was fatally knifed in his school uniform outside McDonald’s, in Stratford Broadway, at 3:20 pm last week Thursday. It was reported that paramedics tried to keep the teenager alive, who witnesses saw collapsed in a pool of blood, but he was pronounced dead at the scene just half an hour later.
Police believe Baptista, who was described by family as a ‘nice boy’, was attacked shortly after he got off of the bus by another 15-year-old. One of his friends who was with him was rushed to hospital with stab wounds, where he survived with non-life-threatening injuries. The talented footballer, who was wearing the uniform of Catholic boys’ school St Bonaventure’s, in Forest Gate, when he was attacked, had recently tried out for League One team Ipswich Town.
Baptista’s mother disclosed that his son had phoned her to say he was on his way home just 20 minutes before he was assassinated. His mum had offered to pick him up from school due to the delays on the DLR route amid Extinction Rebellion protests. But he said he would catch the bus after school instead, as he wanted to go to McDonald’s with a friend.
His aunt Aretha Adjei said Baptista’s heartbroken mum ‘keeps saying how she should have gone and picked him up’. She told the Evening Standard: ‘His mother is not coping well. She only has two children. You can’t imagine her pain… ‘He was a fun-loving boy, very popular with everyone in the church, everyone in the street knew him.
Just five hours after Baptista was knifed, an 18-year-old was found with stab wounds near a children’s nursery in Brandon Estate, Camberwell, south London. Their deaths take the number of teenagers murdered in the capital this year to 23. Police have described the attacks as “senseless”.
Source: Ghanaweb
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So sad mum, may the good Lord be with ypu
In this 21st century it is still considered a crime to be black for which reason one must die. These deaths are just sickening and the same condemnation without concrete action always follow: "These attacks are senseless and our thoughts are with the bereaved family...". The time of the crime indicates that this happened in broad day-light and could have been prevented if the boy was not black! It is incomprehensible that in spite of what blacks have achieved all over the world in various fields of endeavor some ,some less-than-human species still denigrate blacks. Barack Obama is black,Michael Jordan is black,Oprah Winfrey is Black, Ben Carson is black,Condoleeza Rice is black, Nelson Mandela is black,Kwame Nkrumah is black,Martin Luther King is black,Colin Powell is black, Maya Angelou is black,Pele is black,Wole Soyinka is black,chinua achebe is black. What is wrong with those diick-heads still looking down on blacks!
This is a boy i know personally. So sad. Parents in particular mum has toiled for nothing. Mum i want to go to McDonalds with my friends after school and did not return home. Sad. Rest in peace Baptista.