Gnassingbé Eyadéma, the President of Togo, was on board the aircraft, which was flying from Lomé to his native village, Pya.[2] Eyadéma claimed the aircraft had been sabotaged after he had reneged on an agreement with a French company over the use of a phosphate mine.The monument features a statue of Eyadéma standing on a plinth, flanked by images of his generals who died in the crash.[4] Eyadéma was not the sole survivor of the crash,[5][6] but he deliberately misrepresented the details of the accident to make himself look like a hero with superhuman strength who miraculously survived the disaster when everyone else was killed.[9][10] His C-47 was replaced by a new presidential jet, a Gulfstream II (registered as 5V-TAA) which was itself damaged beyond repair in a crash on 26 December of the same year, which killed three members of the crew, but which all three of the passengers on board survived.