Authorities in Brazzaville announced that an unspecified number of other people were also injured in the incident.
Authorities said on Tuesday that 37 people died in an overnight stampede during an army recruitment drive at a stadium in Brazzaville, the capital of the Republic of Congo.
Last week, the army of the Central African country, also known as Congo-Brazzaville, announced it was recruiting 1,500 people aged 18 to 25.
Prime Minister Anatole Collinet Makosso, who said 37 people died in the “tragedy”, announced that an unspecified number of other people were also injured.
“A crisis unit reporting to the Prime Minister has been established,” he added in a statement. Other details of the incident are unclear at this time.
Potential recruits were instructed to go to the Michel d’Ornano Stadium in the heart of Brazzaville.
According to local residents, there were still many people at the stadium on Monday evening when the panic began. Residents said some people tried to get through the gates and many were trampled.
Unemployment is rampant in the country of 5.8 million people, where, according to the World Bank, “75 percent of the Congolese labor force is employed in the informal sector, either self-employed or in low-productivity jobs.”
