Sky News has apologized for misreporting on the identity of a stowaway that fell from the skies in London as the plane landed at Heathrow Airport.
In a correction published on Thursday, Sky News also apologized to JKIA cleaning company Colnet for suggesting the stowaway was one of their employees.
“We no longer have conclusive evidence that he worked for the cleaning company,” Sky News said.
The report that was done last week Africa correspondent John Sparks identified the stowaway as Nairobi airport worker by the name Paul Manyasi.
“This was based on corroborating interviews with people who identified as friends, relatives and colleagues of Paul Manyasi – including his father,” they said.
This comes after Daily Nation interviewed the man whose photos Sky News pulled from his Facebook page in prison.
He is remanded facing defilement charges.
The man’s name is Cedric Isaac Shivonje and not Paul Manyasi as claimed by Sky News.
His father, Isaac Betti, admitted to lying to the British broadcaster, saying he wanted to protect his son because he didn’t want villagers to know he was in jail. He had not seen him for two years until on Wednesday, November 20.
“Sky News regrets that our reporting was founded on misleading information,” Sky News says.
However, the broadcaster insists the Kenyan Civil Aviation Authority had previously acknowledged that it was possible that the stowaway was an airport employee.
But the Kenya Airports Authority said the name Paul Manyasi does not appear in the JKIA staff register.
