Court action looms over SAA’s ‘one-sided’ flight cancellations
The National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) and Solidarity have signalled possible legal action over the decision by South African Airways’ (SAA) business rescue practitioners to scrap flights.
“No proper justification, no detail in the plan – he cannot even tell us how much money they will be saving for making this drastic decision,” said Numsa spokesperson Phakamile Hlubi-Majola on Thursday evening.
Hlubi-Majola says the business rescue practitioners failed to adequality consult labour over their plans to close almost all domestic routes and some international flights.
It is SAA’s latest bid to save cash.
The cash-strapped national airline has not made a profit for more than a decade and keeps aircraft in the air by government bailouts.
Numsa has signalled that they may be heading to the court to remove SAA’s business rescue practitioners, Les Matuson and Siviwe Dongwana.
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“What we see as provocation, they are just railroading us, and we are just forced to go along with the ride.”
Trade union Solidarity says they are in talks with their legal team over the decision.
The union’s Anton van der Bijl says they too were never consulted.
“They know very well that they must take into account the views of the trade unions and employees before making any decisions. It’s quite unfortunate that they didn’t consult us, and for that specific reasons we might possible go to court to prevent that decision.”