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Let’s hope that Northampton High Schoolers are not the class of their town.
In a shameful act of poor sportsmanship during a soccer match between Northampton and Nazareth Area High School, several players on the Northampton team chanted “Ebola” at Ibrahim Toumkara.
Toumkara moved from Guinea in West Africa three years ago, and the rest of his family still lives in the West African nation.
As Guinea shares a border with Liberia, the location of the Ebola outbreak, Toumkara’s family is constantly at risk of contracting the disease.
The chant deeply hurt Toumkara who, according to his coach Edward Bachert, “[had] tears coming down his eyes. He was visibly shaken by this; that it got to that level on the field.”
Bashert is the Lehigh country police chief and also the boy’s legal guardian.
The incident has led to an investigation, and the head and assistant coaches of Northampton have already resigned.
In light of all this trauma, Ibrahim appears to be taking the high road: “They just need to learn how to give other people respect…I want them to know we are all the same, nothing can make us be different.”
