The family of the Nigerian diplomat that was killed in the Boeing 737 Max that crashed in Ethiopia in 2019 has joined litigation against the company in United States federal court. Heir lawyers of Abiodun Bashua accused Boeing of negligence during the development of the Max.
The 67-year-old Bashua had performed a lot of foreign service jobs for Nigeria and also worked with the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa during his 40-year career. He was part of the 157 people that was killed when a Max operated by Ethiopian Airlines crashed not long after takeoff from Addis Ababa.
During a press conference organized by the lawyers of the family, Lekan Bashua, one of Abiodun Bashua’s sons said: “Thinking of him sitting in a plane, a place he was very comfortable … watching a bunch of people falling to the ground and knowing that they were about to perish, knowing that for the first time in a long time he could not do anything about it, is one of those memories that haunts me today.”
The lawsuit of Bashua family, which also named Boeing contractors, Rosemount Aerospace and Rockwell Collins Inc., was filed in United States district court in Chicago, where lawsuits filed by many of families have been merged into two cases — one for the crash in Ethiopia and the other for a 2018 Max crash that occurred in Indonesia where 189 people died.
