Claim: Benin, Togo, Burkina Faso and Côte d’Ivoire have presidential jets
Source: Dr. Matthew Opoku-Prempeh (Napo)
Verdict: Mixture
Researched by Gifty Danso
Former Energy Minister and New Patriotic Party (NPP) vice presidential candidate, Dr Matthew Opoku Prempeh has claimed that four of Ghana’s West African neighbours have presidential jets.
He made the claim on Asempa FM’s Ekosii sen programme on August 26, 2025, while speaking in an interview focusing on a range of issues, including the August 6 helicopter crash, the Chief Justice’s suspension and President Mahama’s performance in office so far.
Speaking on the presidential jets, he said: “Benin has a big presidential jet, Togo has a big one, Burkina Faso has a big one, Ivory Coast has a big one, as for Liberia, I don’t know… These neighbouring countries I’ve mentioned, they all have some.
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“These economies I have mentioned, I don’t see which one is better than Ghana… If Ghana had one, it wouldn’t be bad. In West Africa, Ghana is the first sovereign country to get its airline, Ghana Airways…” (watch between 1:33:35 – 1:34:28 of the interview).
This fact-check will verify whether the countries mentioned in the claim have presidential jets.
Fact-check
Using keyword search and analysis of recent official trips by leaders of the listed countries, GhanaFact found that at least only two of the countries have presidential jets – Cote d’Ivoire and Burkina Faso. Out of these two, only Ivory Coast’s president actively uses the presidential jet.
Côte d’Ivoire
The Ivorian government, per our investigations, has more than one presidential jet. On Alamy, the British stock photography agency, a 2018 photo of the Ivorian presidential jet is listed. The plane, draped in colours of the country, has the inscription, “Republique De Cote D’Ivoire.”
The photo was taken when the Ivorian President’s jet landed at the VIP terminal of Beijing Capital International Airport ahead of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) in Beijing, China, on August 28, 2018.
Further checks show that in 2021, when leaders from the ECOWAS region attended the heads of state summit in Accra, President Alassane Ouattara flew in an Airbus A319, which is part of the Airbus A320 family of commercial passenger twin-engine jet airliners manufactured by Airbus. (find here).
When GhanaFact analysed some of Ouattara’s recent trips this year, we found that he travelled with a presidential plane on trips he took to France in March 2025. (here).
Reports here and here have also documented the purchase of a presidential aircraft by the Ivorian government in 2023. Therefore, it is accurate to say the Ivorian government has a presidential jet being actively used by the sitting president.
Benin
Our investigation shows that Benin does not have a presidential jet. In two of President Patrice Talon’s official trips in June and May 2025, he flew with chartered private jets.
While attending the 2025 Qatar Economic Forum in May, the Benin leader flew with ‘Setair’, a Turkey-based airline that offers private jet and air taxi services. This can be seen from the 14-second mark of the one minute video shared on the Facebook page of the Benin Presidency.
When President Talon made another trip in June to Brazil, he used ‘Vistajet, an aviation company that offers private jet services.’ This can also be seen from the very beginning as he steps down from the aeroplane in the 29-second video shared by the Benin Presidency.
We equally found that in Benin, there have been conversations around a presidential jet. The last presidential aircraft the country had under the previous leader, Thomas Boni Yayi, was returned to South Africa in 2016 when President Talon took office (here, here, and here).
Togo
Togo, also like Benin, does not currently have a presidential jet. We reviewed most of the Togolese leader Faure Gnassingbé’s recent travels, and for most of 2025, he travelled by chartered airplane.
From two of his trips this year, GhanaFact found that he used a commercial jet plane known as the Dassault Falcon 8X. These were for trips to Ghana for the Africa Prosperity Dialogues in February and Angola in April. He has also previously used the chartered Airbus A318 Elite (reg. LX-LTI) from Global Jet Luxembourg.
However, reports, here and here indicate that the Togolese government had owned a presidential aircraft before but not currently.
Burkina Faso
In Burkina Faso, information is limited on the issue of the presidential jet. Per our checks, the country’s presidential plane, nicknamed the “Pic du Nahouri – after the country’s highest mountain— has been grounded for years (here, here, and here).
The country’s leader, Ibrahim Traore, in his recent trip to Moscow this year, is reported to have used a plane provided by Russia.
GhanaFact reached out to a colleague fact-checker with FasoCheck about the status of their presidential jet: “Since the official presidential plane, “Pic du Nahouri,” broke down under Roch Kaboré, Burkina Faso has not purchased a presidential plane,” Ange Levi Jordan told us via WhatsApp.
Verdict
Therefore, the claim that all four countries have presidential planes is a Mixture. Only Cote d’Ivoire’s president has over the years been seen using the presidential plane for official travel.
Ghana’s case of presidential jets
In Ghana, conversations around presidential jets have been topical in the last few years. In 2021, under former President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, the National Democratic Congress (NDC), then an opposition party, criticised the government’s plans to purchase a new presidential jet (here and here).
President Akufo-Addo had also come under fire for using chartered private jets for his travels, with claims from opposition suggesting they were luxurious travels.
More recently, the issue concerning presidential jets came up again when the late Defence Minister Dr. Omane Boamah briefed the press in July about the status of the current presidential jet. He noted that Ghana’s presidential jet (the Falcon 900EX aircraft) has been grounded due to extensive corrosion and remains unfit for service (here, here, and here).
While the current administration has not yet indicated plans to buy a new plane for the president’s official travel, the Minister of Government Communication, Felix Kwakye Ofosu, said the idea may not be entirely off the table. He affirmed this in an interview with Asempa FM on August 20, 2025 (here).
