The Scene
When Boeing pleaded guilty to a criminal fraud conspiracy charge this week, it resolved an investigation into crashes involving its 737 Max aircraft. But it sparked anger among relatives of people killed in the Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 crash five years ago.
Many of those whose loved ones were among the 157 people killed in the March 2019 crash, just outside Addis Ababa’s Bole Airport, were shocked that their hopes of a criminal prosecution yielding fresh details behind the cause of the tragedy, had been dashed. They knew the crash was not an isolated incident. Months earlier, a Boeing 737 Max plane operated by Indonesia’s Lion Air crashed shortly after take-off, killing all 189 people on board. But they hoped a prosecution would yield more information.
Instead, as part of the plea deal, the plane-maker agreed to pay a fine of $243.6 million. It’s a far cry from the $24.8 billion fine that relatives of the victims wanted to see imposed on Boeing.
“We are extremely disappointed that the US Department of Justice is moving forward with this wholly inadequate plea deal despite the families’ strong opposition to its terms”, Erin R Applebaum, a lawyer representing 34 Ethiopian families of those on the Ethiopian Airlines flight, told Semafor.
“The deal is nothing more than a slap on the wrist”, Applebaum added.
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There has been a long-standing relationship between Ethiopian Airlines and Boeing which goes back decades but has ramped in recent years as tha airline expands across the continent. At last year’s Dubai air show, the state-owned airline signed a deal to purchase up to 67 Boeing planes, including 20 Boeing 737 MAX aircraft valued at $5.6 billion, with the option of purchasing additional 21 737 MAX planes.
This year Boeing announced it is opening its first Africa office in Addis Ababa.
Ethiopian Airlines is also building financial stakes in a number of African airlines, including in the national airlines of Zambia and Mozambique. It continues to rely heavily on Boeing planes.
The airline was one of the few international airlines highlighted for using its MAX planes just three years after regulators forced it to ground such planes.
Samuel’s view
The Ethiopian government, which has a rapidly growing commercial interest with Boeing, has been accused of being tone-deaf when it comes to the plight of some of the aircraft crash victims.
“Senior executives of Boeing who concealed critical information about the fight control software should be held accountable,” said Kaleyesue Bekele, an aviation expert. “Corporate greed cost 346 innocent lives. The crash of the Ethiopian flight was preventable after what happened with the Indonesian Lion Air accident”.
The robust commercial ties between the Ethiopian Airlines and Boeing have been a concern to many who lost their loved ones in the doomed Ethiopian Airlines flight. Many of the crash victims have been vocal critics of Boeing amid negligible accountability and demonstration of empathy from the airline.
“Such a deal only widens our wound,” said a woman whose 29-year-old daughter was among those killed. “We haven’t seen any accountability but we are all expected to receive financial compensation and move on,” the woman, who asked to remain anonymous due to her fear of reprisal by Boeing, told me.