Flight records disprove Luanda stop claim in alleged cocaine, money trafficking saga at KIA – Fact Check Ghana

The Minority Caucus in Parliament alleged in a press conference last week that they suspected two airplanes which landed in Ghana in March 2025 trafficked cocaine and money into the country.

The MP for Assin South Constituency, Rev. John Ntim Fordjour, who addressed the press conference in Parliament, said:

“Reliable intelligence intercepted by the minority indicates that on March 20, 2025, AirMed flight N823AM, which is an air ambulance, and I must stress, it’s an air ambulance, designed specifically to carry patients landed at the Kotoka International Airport in Accra, Ghana and remained in the country for five days before departing on March 25 back to Gran Canaria.”

He added that the intelligence suggested that the air ambulance did not carry any patient, nor did it depart with one, but rather carried items suspected to be cocaine and money in various US dollars and other currencies.

Rev. Ntim Fordjour further alleged that another plane, Cavok Air private jet Atonov An-12B, which also landed at the Kotoka International Airport on March 12, 2025, from Gran Canaria, was suspected of trafficking drugs and money. According to the MP, the private jet remained in the country until March 25, when it returned to Gran Canaria.

Minister of Government Communications and MP for Abura Asebu Kwamankese, Felix Ofosu Kwakye, has responded to the claims by Rev. Ntim, labeling the allegations as false. In a broadcast published on his social media pages on April 2, the minister explained that both flights, though unrelated, arrived in Ghana for “genuine reasons” and their arrivals were “perfectly legitimate”. He explained that the flights made stops for either “scanning and screening” or for refueling, but realized that they developed some faults that were later repaired before they left the country. He firmly denied the drug trafficking and money laundering allegations.

The allegations made by Rev. Ntim and the explanation provided by Felix Ofosu Kwakye have generated enormous public debate and media discussions, leaving many confused about the facts of the matter.

In this report, Fact-Check Ghana presents facts about the travel history of the airplanes that have been mentioned in the alleged drug trafficking and money laundering issues.

While Fact-check Ghana could not ascertain what was contained in the airplanes when they arrived at the Kotoka International Airport, we were able to confirm when the flights landed and departed from the country.

We verified the claims by consulting a number of real-time flight tracking platforms, including FlightAware, FlightRadar24, Flight Finder, and AirNavRadar.  

AirMed Flight N823AM

Both Rev. Ntim Fordjour and Mr. Kwakye mentioned AirMed flight number N823AM in their claims. AirMed flight N823AM is a Hawker 800XP air ambulance operated by AirMed International. The company is based in Birmingham, Alabama, US, and operates a fee-for-service air ambulance service.

According to the open source flight activity history of N823AM, as captured by FlightAware, the flight moved from its base in Birmingham Shuttlesworth International to St John’s International Airport in Canada on March 18, 2025. It moved the following day from Canada to the Santa Maria International Airport on the Island of Santa Maria in Portugal. On that same day, March 19, 2025, the AirMed N823AM moved from Santa Maria to Gran Canaria International Airport.

The following day, on March 20, 2025, the flight moved from Gran Canaria and landed at the Kotoka International Airport at 9:02 GMT. It stayed at Kotoka until it departed on March 25, 2025, at 1:02 am, back to Gran Canaria. On that same day, it went back to Santa Maria and then to St John’s International in Canada.

Below is an extract of the activity history of AirMed N823AM

Source: flightaware.com

Did AirMed N823AM “go through” Luanda before landing in Ghana?

In his response to the allegations leveled by Rev John Ntim Forjour about AirMed flight N823AM, the Minister of Government Communications, Felix Ofosu Kwakye, said, “Now this flight landed in Ghana on 20^th March from Gran Canaria, Las Palmas, Spain, having gone through Luanda in Angola.”

Thus, the minister’s response suggested that N823AM made a stop at Luanda in Angola. However, Fact-Check Ghana’s checks of the flight activity history of N823AM from the available open source data did not find evidence to support the minister’s claim.

The available detailed flight history shows that N823AM flew directly from the Gran Canaria Island to Kotoka International Airport.

Details on the ‘helping’ flight AirMed N864AM

In Felix Ofosu Kwakye’s broadcast, he indicated that when AirMed N823AM developed a fault when it landed at Kotoka International Airport on March 20, another flight was sent to supply materials needed for its servicing. He said the flight, with registration number N864AM, landed at Kotoka International Airport on March 22.

Fact-Check Ghana’s verification indeed confirms that N864AM, a Hawker 800XPi, landed in Ghana on March 22 at 5:44 am GMT. However, contrary to the Minister’s claim that the flight came from Luanda, Angola, the data shows that N864AM flew straight from the Gran Canaria Island.

After staying at the Kotoka International Airport for almost two hours, N864AM flew at 7:24 am on the same day to a location “near Luanda”, according to FlightAware. Hours later, the flight flew from Quatro de Fevereiro International Airport in Luanda to the Lanseria International Airport, a privately owned airport in Johannesburg, South Africa, on that same day, March 22, 2025.

The Return of the AirMed N864AM to Ghana

On March 23, 2025, AirMed N864AM returned to the Kotoka International Airport from the Quatro de Fevereiro International Airport in Luanda. The plane landed at 12: 15 am GMT.

AirMed N864AM stayed for over 24 hours in Ghana and left at 1:20 am GMT on March 24, 2024, for the Gran Canaria Island.

Below is an extract of the activity history of AirMed N864AM

Source: flightaware.com

Antonov Flights CVK7037 and CVK7007

Rev Ntim in the presser stated that a cargo plane, “Cavok Air private jet Antonov An-12B”, was also suspected to have contained the trafficked drugs and money. Even though the name he provided was just the aircraft model, Felix Ofosu Kwakye, in his response, presented what he believes is the registration number of the cargo plane. The minister said the cargo plane’s registration number is CVK7037, which landed in Ghana on March 12, 2025.

Cavok Airlines is a Ukrainian cargo airline based in Kyiv, the country’s capital. It runs a number of private jets available for charter.

When Fact-Check Ghana checked on the flight activity history on CVK7037, we did not find any available data on all the accessible open source platforms that track flights. The last time the platforms tracked CVK7037 was on December 2024 when it moved from Malaga, Spain, on December 18 to a location near Cairo, Egypt, on December 19.

According to Felix Ofosu Kwakye, when CVK7037 landed in Ghana for a technical stop, it developed an “engine blade fault”, and it also had a “severe oil leakage”. The minister explained that another cargo flight, CVK7007, was brought down to evacuate the cargo that CVK7037 carried.

Again, checks by Fact-Check Ghana on the travel activity history of CVK7007 yielded limited results. The latest available travel activity data on CVK7007 shows that it flew from Harare, Zimbabwe, on March 15, 2025 and landed in Kotoka on the same day at 12:23 pm GMT. This gives some credence to the claim by Felix Ofosu Kwakye that the plane indeed came to Ghana.

It must be noted that the absence of travel activity history of CVK7037 and CVK7007 does not mean they did not fly in and out of Ghana. It is not unusual for the flight activity history of private jets to be missing from publicly available data.

In conclusion, the claims about the times of arrival and departure of AirMed N823AM at the Kotoka International Airport are consistent with the open source data of the flight’s activity history. However, there’s no evidence to support Felix Ofosu Kwakye’s claim that AirMed N823AM went through Luanda, Angola, before coming to Ghana. Also, AirMed N864AM, which, according to the minister, was sent down to bring materials to service AirMed N823AM, did not only come to Ghana once. The flight landed at Kotoka International Airport on March 22 and returned on March 23 before leaving for Gran Canaria Island on March 24.

Source: Kwaku Krobea Asante/FactCheckGhana