After landing in Accra, the footballer’s body was taken to the morgue of a military hospital
The body of footballer Christian Atsu, who died in an earthquake in Turkey two weeks ago, has been repatriated to Ghana.
The plane landed in the Ghanaian capital, Accra, late Sunday and members of the Ghana Armed Forces carried his coffin.
Atsu was found dead on Saturday under the rubble of his home in southern Turkey. The young man was playing in the Turkish football club “Hatayspor”.
The player won 65 international matches with his country, Ghana, and helped his team reach the final of the African Cup of Nations in 2015.
Atsu, 31, also played for Premier League clubs Everton and Newcastle United.
Speaking at Kotoka Airport in the capital, Accra, Ghanaian Vice President Muhammadu Bumea said: “We hoped so little, with each passing day, we prayed and prayed. Alas, when he was found he was gone.”
Bumiya said the late footballer was deeply loved and will be sorely missed, adding, “It is a painful loss, very painful.”
He promised that Atsu would be given a “proper” burial.
Atsu has been missing since the devastating earthquake, which occurred on February 6, measuring 7.8 on the Richter scale, and which caused the collapse of his apartment in Antakya, the capital of the hard-hit province of Hatay.
The Turkish club Hatayspor initially announced that the player, who sustained injuries due to the earthquake, had been rescued, but this position was later changed, and his agent confirmed the news of his death on Saturday via Twitter.
The earthquake and aftershocks killed about 46,000 people in Turkey and northern Syria.
The Ghanaian Foreign Ministry said that the body of the soccer player was accompanied from Turkey by his family and Ghana’s ambassador to Turkey.
The plane that carried the body landed in Accra at 19:25 on Sunday GMT, where the player’s relatives, government officials and representatives of the Ghana Football Association were waiting for it. The coffin was later transferred to the morgue of a military hospital.
Many mourned the late player.
Atsu also played for Premier League clubs Everton and Newcastle United
On Saturday, his wife, Marie-Claire Rubio, and their three children joined fans in Newcastle to honor him with a minute’s silence, ahead of the club’s Premier League match against Liverpool.
Atsu had played for Newcastle from 2016 to 2021.
Atsu’s face was shown on the big screen and the fans cheered loudly, “You’ll Never Walk Alone”, before applause.
On Sunday, Ghanaian national team player Mohamed Quddus honored his former colleague after scoring a goal for Ajax in the Dutch league, and took off his shirt to reveal a white shirt that read, “Rest in peace, Atsu.”
Meanwhile, the charity Arms Around the Child paid tribute to Atsu, who has been an ambassador for the organization since 2016, and said he was the “major benefactor” of a school in Ghana that supports abandoned children, orphans, the chronically ill and those rescued from human trafficking.
The organization said that Atsu was “a young boy who came from a poor background in Ghana, who persevered to pursue his dreams and used his talent and position to help others.”