Post misleadingly claims US vendetta against Nigerian airline owner over London routes

Published on October 17, 2024 at 19:08
3 min read
By Samad UTHMAN, AFP Nigeria

The news of a second US indictment of Nigerian airline founder Allen Onyema in October 2024 has reignited public interest after years of silence on the case. A social media post alleges the fresh court charges are a form of witch-hunt against Onyema over the launch of a Lagos-to-London route by his airline Air Peace in March 2024. But the claim is misleading: Onyema was first charged by the US court in November 2019 with bank fraud and money laundering and is now being indicted for obstruction of justice. He denies the charges.

“Nobody knew about any fraud until he started flying to London. They are here to stop Airpeace (sic),” reads an X post that has gathered more than 3,000 shares since it was published on October 13, 2024.

Screenshot showing the misleading X post, taken October 15, 2024

The post includes photos of Onyema and his chief financial officer Ejiroghene Eghagha. The collage also features a text overlay reading: “US court has issued an arrest warrant for the CFO of Air Peace, while the FBI has filed fresh charges against the airline’s CEO, Allen Onyema, related to a multimillion-dollar fraud case.”

The claim was posted by an account with 25,000 followers called “Dr. Kenon”, a self-proclaimed Obidient — a term that describes the political movement created during the 2023 election to support the candidacy of Labour Party (LP) flagbearer Peter Obi.

The account’s feed showed random anti-government posts and favourable content about the Obidient movement and Obi.

Onyema is a Nigerian businessman recognised for his strides in the airline industry. In May 2022, the Nigerian government honoured Onyema with a national merit award for providing thousands of jobs (archived here).

His airline is also one of the largest in West Africa (archived here). Flights between Lagos and London were launched in March 2024 (archived here).

However, the claim that the US court first filed charges after Onyema's carrier opened a new route to the UK earlier this year is misleading.

Fresh indictment

The US Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Georgia announced it had filed new indictments against Onyema, in a press statement released on October 11, 2024 (archived here).

Onyema and Eghagha are accused of obstructing justice in a bid to end investigations on existing charges of bank and money fraud filed five years earlier.

“After allegedly using his airline company as a cover to commit fraud on the United States’ banking system, Onyema, along with his co-defendant, allegedly committed additional crimes of fraud in a failed attempt to derail the government’s investigation of his conduct,” the statement quotes US Attorney Ryan K. Buchanan as saying.

In response, Air Peace said its legal team was “fully engaged with the matter and is working tirelessly to ensure that justice prevails” (archived here).

Existing fraud charges

Warrants of arrest for Onyema and Eghagha were issued in the US and Canada in 2019 (archived here).

They were accused of moving suspicious funds from Nigeria to American bank accounts between 2017 and 2018, allegedly disguised for the purchase of aircrafts.

A total of 36 charges of conspiracy, money laundering, bank fraud, credit application fraud, and identity theft in excess of $20 million were filed against Onyema and Eghagha and others (archived here).

An accomplice was jailed in 2022 after pleading guilty.

With the two new counts, the Air Peace founder and his CFO will have a total of 38 counts hanging over them if extradited to the US from Nigeria.

The US and Nigeria have a longstanding extradition pact but it is not clear if a request has been submitted to Nigerian authorities yet to have the pair extradited (archived here).

Is there content that you would like AFP to fact-check? Get in touch.

E-mail