IFP welcomes bold and decisive decision in placing SAA under business rescue

5 December 2019

The IFP welcomes and supports the bold and decisive action to place South African Airways (SAA) under voluntary business rescue. 

It is high time that South Africans bear witness to such bold and decisive action and in seeing bang for their hard-earned buck.

In delivering the IFP's farewell speech today to mark the end of the 2019 Parliamentary Session, IFP President Emeritus and Parliamentary Leader, Prince Mangosuthu Buthelezi MP, called for decisive leadership as regards to State Owned Entities (SOEs), which amongst other things includes emulating the decisions of former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, when it came to SOEs. 

In pursuit of privatisation, the IFP maintains that as a start, the establishment of a public-private partnership at SAA is best to ensure that long term financial sustainability and service excellence prevails.

It is our hope that this type of decisive and bold action is taken against all those in management and on Boards who are responsible for the critical financial and key management failures at many of our SOEs.

We are pleased with this decision in regards to avoiding any further cash cows and we call on the shareholder to work very closely with the business rescue practitioner in ensuring that when the airline undergoes "radical" restructuring jobs are cut from the top.

We must ensure that this process does not cut at the bottom, because workers with very little influence usually bear the most brutal brunt due to the failures and decisions of those at the top of management at the ailing SOE.

The IFP hopes that SAA will be meticulous in the implementation of this voluntary business process in the collective interests of the airline, fiscus and workers.

The business rescue step is long overdue considering the endless bailouts, totalling R57-billion over the years, which have been afforded to SAA. The airline was currently trading recklessly and financial statements have not been submitted to Parliament for the past two financial years.

The writing has long been on the wall. 

Issued by Inkosi Mzamo Buthelezi, IFP Spokesperson on Public Enterprises and Finance, 5 December 2019