New SAA CEO to be announced soon: Gigaba
Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba says government cannot afford to keep pouring state resources into a failing airline.
Gigaba has outlined government's 14 point action plan which aims to boost inclusive economic growth.
Struggling state-owned enterprises feature heavily in the plan.
The action plan has strict deadlines and hopes to turn around poor performing state-owned enterprises, including Eskom and South African Airways (SAA).
Gigaba says SAA needs strong and decisive leadership to turn the situation around.
He assures a new CEO for the national carrier will be announced at the end of this month.
"The responsibility to turn the airline around by appointing someone with good business grounding and acumen, someone with turnaround expertise who is going to help us achieve what SAA has failed to achieve over the last decade," Gigaba says.
"So much has happened at SAA. So many CEOs have come and gone. None of them have stayed long enough to achieve what is possible."
Gigaba says government will no longer finance inefficiency.
"So much money has been invested into the airline in the form of guarantees and bailouts. A point must be reached where we no longer continue to give our public resources to the airline."