Riyaz Patel
Interim SAA CFO Deon Fredricks said management had “bent over backwards” to make a deal with striking workers, with unions accusing the airline of “grandstanding.”
The National Union of Metalworkers (Numsa), the SA Cabin Crew Association (Sacca) and the South African Transport and Allied Workers Union (Satawu) are angry over restructuring plans which could see more than 900 job slashed at the airline.
Speaking in New York, Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan said bluntly “If some tough decisions need to be made, we’ll make them SAA is not too big to fail.”
The unions have also rejected the carrier’s 5.9% pay increase offer, demanding 8%.
Some of the unions are politically motivated, Gordhan said.
“They’re risking the future of the airline and the jobs of everybody else. Hopefully they come to their senses before we go too far.”
Fredricks said “We’d given them a new offer that we will pay them six months back pay in April, the balance in October.
We will then also increase their salaries by 5% in April. Yesterday, we improved that offer, that we will pay them in March and we will go and look for funding to go and pay for that.“
SAA has cancelled more than 100 local and international flights for today and Saturday.
Satawu, meanwhile, is heading to court to apply for an urgent interdict to halt the airlines’ bid to retrench almost 1 000 workers.
“This whole grandstanding now where they’ve already stopped flights when all they could have done was come to the table. We’re just not sure what it is they’re doing but it’s unreasonable, it’s unprocedural and they need to come to their senses and come to the table,” said Satawu’s Zanele Sabela, accusing the the national carrier of taking decisions unilaterally.
Sacca called for accountability and better management at SAA.
“By mid-December, they could get enough money from procurement that they’re spending irregularly, from contracts that are overpriced that can fund the increase. So, we’ve given them solutions and it’s just for them to do the work and make sure that it happens,” Sacca Spokesperson Zazi Nsibanyoni-Mugambi said.
SAA’s acting CEO Zuks Ramasia has warned that the airline, which is technically insolvent, may not be able to recover from the strike.
The National Treasury said in the medium-term budget policy statement in October that it will repay the loss-making SAA’s outstanding government-guaranteed debt of R9.2bn over the next three years.
Meanwhile, Airports Company South Africa (Acsa) said they were working with SAA and other airlines to minimise the impact of the strike.
In a statement, the company said that operational disruptions were being kept to a minimum as a result of contingency plans activated earlier in the week.
Additional ground, terminal and security staff have been deployed at airports this morning to provide support to passengers and airlines that are processing re-bookings for affected passengers.
The airline said that its restructuring plan would be finalised by March next year and it’s intended to save the firm R700 million.
