Boeing to pay families in Ethiopia air crash Sh15m

Aircraft manufacturer Boeing has started receiving applications from families that lost loved ones in the Ethiopian Airlines crash in March.

The BBC reported Tuesday that the applications should be made before 2020 and that each family will be entitled to $144,500 (Sh15 million).

"The money comes from a $50 million financial assistance fund, which Boeing announced in July," reported the BBC.

A number of lawyers representing the affected families have rejected the offer but, according to Murang’a Senator Irungu Kang'ata, whose law firm is part of a team representing 15 Kenyan families, the Boeing "gift" is welcome.

"The gift from Boeing is welcome as long as it does not have strings attached to it," Mr Kang'ata said.

"Boeing should not use the gift as a ploy to influence the jury. It should also disclose the methods of disbursement of those funds noting so far the information remains hazy," he added.

Lawyers opposed to the move told the BBC that the amount is too small. "$144,000 doesn't come close to compensating any of our families or any of the families," Nomaan Husain, a Texas-based attorney who is representing 15 families.

In a press briefing in July, Mr Kang’ata and lawyer Stephen Gachie, whose respective law firms are working with two other firms in the US, said the families they represented had rejected an out-of-court settlement from Boeing.