Hosting the African Cup of Nations was Angola's chance to show it is recovering from decades of war. But gunmen sprayed bullets at Togo's national team, killing three people and forcing its withdrawal from the soccer tournament. The attack in Angola, a former Portuguese colony, killed an assistant coach, a team spokesperson and the bus driver, according to the team and the Togolese government. “Despite this, the championship will go on,” Angola's Sports Minister Goncalves Muandumba said. “We have goose bumps ... who knows what is going to happen to us,” Amade Chababe, assistant coach to the Mozambique national football team, told AP Television News as the squad passed through Johannesburg en route to Angola Saturday. In South Africa, the local organizing committee of the World Cup said the attack had no relevance to the upcoming global sports event that starts in June. Spokesman Rich Mkhondo said organizers view Friday's attack as an isolated incident which could have happened anywhere in the world. FIFA expressed “utmost sympathy” in a statement. Togo forward Thomas Dossevi told The Associated Press in a phone interview that the team plans to withdraw from the continentwide tournament and fly out of the country early Sunday. Emmanuel Adebayor who is captain of the Togo team and a top player for Manchester City, described a vicious attack on a defenseless team. Unrest associated with Cabinda, a northern enclave cut off from the rest of Angola by a strip of Congo, has been at low levels. The main separatist group is the Front for the Liberation of the Enclave of Cabinda, or FLEC. The Angolan information minister blamed the group for the attack. Portugal's state-run Lusa news agency said FLEC claimed responsibility in a message Friday. In a statement e-mailed to The Associated Press Saturday, the civilian arm of the separatist group did not claim responsibility for what it called an “unfortunate incident,” but said it was irresponsible of organizers to have ignored warnings from separatists that matches should not be held in Cabinda. Adebayor said that minutes after entering Cabinda “from nowhere gunmen began to open fire on our bus.” He said the team endured the gunfire for 30 minutes before Angolan soldiers repulsed the assailants. Goalie Kossi Agassa - who plays for French club Istres and for the Togo team in the tournament – told France-Info radio that a Togo assistant coach and a spokesperson died and that a second team goalkeeper was badly wounded. Kodjovi “Dodji” Obilale, an injured goalkeeper who also plays for the French club Pontivy, was flown to South Africa where he underwent surgery for injuries to his back, said club president Philippe Le Mestre by telephone from western France. Richard Friedland, CEO of Milpark Hospital in Johannesburg, told reporters that Obilale suffered two gunshot wounds to the lower back and will undergo surgery Saturday night. “He is fully receptive. He understands where he is,” Friedland said.
