The Democratic Alliance (DA) noted the insinuation by the South African Airways (SAA) Business Rescue Practitioners (BRPs) at the SAA meeting with creditors, employees and other stakeholders on 25 June 2020, that the SAA bailout funding of R26.3 billion has ostensibly been agreed to by the Shareholder and the Department of Public Enterprises (DPE) and that any changes to the business rescue plan that require additional funding would be unfunded.
If this is true it would indicate a violation of the Public Finance Management Act (PFMA) as the DPE cannot make decisions for Parliament about the appropriation of funds.
It is astounding that affected parties were being asked to vote for a SAA business rescue plan that requires a total of R 33 billion in funding but which funding has not been sourced. It would be irresponsible in the extreme for parliament to appropriate any further funds for the ANC SAA dead duck project.
The adjournment of today’s SAA meeting with creditors, employees and other stakeholders until the 14th of July 2020 is yet another pointless delay. The whole SAA business rescue plan is based on obtaining a further R16.25 billion in bailout funding. This funding is highly unlikely to be obtained from any private investors and is clearly intended to be further taxpayer bailouts over and above the R16.4 billion already approved by parliament. It is impossible for the approval of parliament to be obtained for the appropriation of a further R16.25 billion in bailout funds for SAA by the 14th of July 2020.
All the delay achieves is to extend the inevitable for unpaid employees who are unable to claim UIF retrenchment benefits because they have not been retrenched.
The DA will robustly oppose any attempt to obtain parliamentary approval for the appropriation of any further funds for bailing out SAA.
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