THREE Nigerian newspapers, Business Day, Leadership and The Nation, published a story (archived here, here and here) suggesting that the embattled chief executive of Air Peace, Allen Onyema, was exonerated of fraud allegations by the District Court in Atlanta.
These reports follow new charges filed by the US Attorney’s Office against Onyema this month, adding to previous allegations of fraud and money laundering dating back to 2019.
The reports by the media houses are titled “US court acquits Air Peace boss, slams Mayfield $4000 fine”, “US Court Clears Air Peace CEO Onyema, Slams $4,000 Fine On Springfield Aviation Ex-Staff” and “US court acquits Air Peace boss, fines Mayfield $4000” respectively.
The opening paragraphs of the reports read “The District Court in Atlanta, Georgia has exonerated Allen Onyema, the Chief Executive of Air Peace, of any business fraud. This is after three years of investigation involving about five agencies of the American government and the subsequent legal fireworks.”
The headlines of the reports suggest the airline boss has been acquitted from the allegations.
Interestingly, the reports did not provide evidence to back the claim.
Reactions and reposts of the stories from the media houses show that the report has been largely misconstrued to mean the businessman has been vindicated.
For instance, an X user, @Mindset_post posted the story with a caption : “The District Court in Atlanta, Georgia has exonerated Allen Onyema, the Chief Executive of Air Peace, of any business fraud.”
The post has generated over 500 reposts as of 10:54 am, October 22 when it was archived.
THE CLAIM
US court acquits Air Peace boss of fraud allegations.
THE FINDINGS
Findings by The FactCheckHub show that the story is FALSE and misleading.
The US government on 11 October charged Allen Onyema, CEO of Nigerian carrier Air Peace, with obstruction of justice, stacking up further criminal charges against the Nigerian businessman.
The US Attorney’s Office, Northern District of Georgia, accused Onyema of submitting false documents to the government to end an investigation into him on charges of bank fraud and money laundering.
In addition, the U.S. government had accused Ebony Mayfield, an American woman, of signing and submitting fabricated documents between 2016 and 2018 to help Onyema move $20 million from Nigeria to the U.S. in an alleged money laundering scheme.
The FactCheckHub ran a keyword search using the story’s headline and found that it was copied verbatim from a news report published in October 2022 by the Guardian Newspaper.
According to the report, the U.S. court acquitted the Air Peace chief of the allegations. This report which they copied is also a false and a misleading presentation of the event.
A correct version of the event was reported by Premium Times within the same period in 2022 showed that while Mayfield’s case was closed, Onyema remains wanted in the U.S.
According to Premium Times, Onyema and Air Peace Limited’s Head of Administration and Finance, Ejiroghene Eghagha, still had 36 charges of fraud and money laundering pending against them since 2019 at the same court.
This year, it was reported that in addition to the earlier $20 million bank fraud case against Onyema, the United States government has piled more charges. This showed that the previous case was still ongoing.
In addition, the US Attorney’s Office in a press statement issued October 11 noted that they are bringing a superseding indictment against the airline boss.
“On October 8, 2024, they were both charged in a superseding indictment alleging an additional count of obstruction of justice and one count of conspiracy to obstruct justice. The case is criminal action number 1:19-CR-464.” the statement reads in part.
A superseding indictment “is a criminal complaint brought by a grand jury that changes, adds to, or replaces an original indictment in the wake of new evidence” according to an explainer by Business Insider.
A major red flag is the fact that three media platforms reported the same story verbatim which signals the possibility of an Influence Operation which is an organised attempt to skew how people see an issue or in this case, a personality.
A look at the three stories showed that the story originated from a statement from the legal firm of the organisation and was not obtained from any court judgment.
THE VERDICT
The claim that the U.S. court has acquitted Air Peace boss Allen Onyema of fraud allegations is FALSE. Findings show that this is a misleading rehash of an old false story, and Onyema still faces multiple charges, with no evidence of exoneration.
Update: The report has been removed from Business Day website.
This report is republished from the FactCheckHub.
Nurudeen Akewushola is an investigative reporter and fact-checker with The ICIR. He believes courageous in-depth investigative reporting is the key to social justice, accountability and good governance in society. You can reach him via nyahaya@icirnigeria.org and @NurudeenAkewus1 on Twitter.
This fraud issue is not good for Nigeria’s image! Hope our government will do the needful by investigating how Onyeama came across the N20million dollars and much more money..
The truth is that evil cannot grow any economy or a nation!