SAA to go under care and maintenance until funding found

Struggling state-owned airline, South African Airways, will be put under “care and maintenance” until funding discussions are completed, the airline’s administrators said on Tuesday.

A company’s assets can be put under care and maintenance in order to keep them in good condition when they are not being used.

The administrators added in a notice to affected parties that certain funders were willing to provide a portion of the funds for the airline’s restructuring plan and that they were engaging with the government on the remaining funding needed.

Confusion over SAA rescue plan:

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Call for a hearing 

Earlier today, the DA said it would soon write to the Chairperson of Parliament’s Standing Committee on Finance, Joe Maswanganyi, to request public hearings on the funding for South African Airways.

The remarks came while the country awaits the Public Enterprises Department’s announcement on government’s decision to reprioritise funds to restructure SAA and implement the plan to rescue the airline. It says it is assessing 20 unsolicited expressions of interests from private sector funders, private equity investors and partners in a restructured SAA.

The DA’s spokesperson on Finance Geordin Hill-Lewis says Parliament should ensure that government’s COVID-19 relief package is spent on helping families whose livelihoods have been destroyed by the lockdown and not funding SAA.

“The DA is calling for special public hearings on the government’s proposed additional bail out of SAA. We believe that it is totally wrong to bail out SAA by cutting services for the poor and COVID-19 relief fund that means that there will be fewer services that people need just to save SAA this is morally indefensible and unacceptable.”

SAA encouraged

He has reiterated that SAA requires R10.5 billion. Additional reporting by SABC News