South Africa’s Parliament on Monday warned against any “restless” attempt to satotage South African Airways (SAA) being gripped by a strike.
Recent reports in the public domain urging South Africans not to fly with SAA “are restless” and would sabotage the national carrier, said Khaya Magaxa, chairperson of Parliament’s Portfolio Committee on Public Enterprises.
Magaxa said that parliament noted with concern the utterances made by trade unions currently engaged in the SAA strike.
The South African Cabin Crew Association (SACCA) and the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA), which organised the strike, had urged South Africans to avoid SAA as its flights would be operated by short-term contracted personnel without the requisite experience.
The unions made the appeal after SAA announced on Sunday that its international flights would be resumed from Sunday night after being suspended since Friday when SAA employees began an indefinite strike.
The airline said in a statement that it had taken the decision to reinstate international service on its route network after assessment of its personnel numbers who are available and willing to operate the flights.
The airline said that while some employees are on strike and have elected to do so in exercising their rights, the airline has a duty to render services to its customers where it has employees who have elected to report for work.
Magaxa said his committee acknowledges the challenges facing SAA, which are a direct result of malfeasance and corruption.
“Workers are not responsible for the situation at the national carrier,” said Magaxa.
He urged SAA management and unions to negotiate to find a solution to resolve the strike, as it has serious ramifications for SAA’s financial situation and other unintended consequences in the economy and the tourism sector.
“The committee would like to appeal to workers not to damage and destroy SAA’s credibility.
“If the employees continue down the path of destruction, this will lead to the destruction of jobs that we seek to protect and increase,” Magaxa said.
According to him, the SAA brand is important in ensuring improvement and profitability.
The work stoppage came after the national flag carrier rejected demands for an eight-percent wage increase and planned to go ahead with its retrenchment of 944 jobs — almost a fifth of its employees, as part of its turnaround strategy.
Cash-strapped SAA has relied on government bailouts for continued operation mainly due to poor management.
Over the past 13 years, the flag carrier has incurred over 28 billion rand (about 1.9 billion U.S. dollars) in cumulative losses.
This loss in revenue is compounded by the fact that the airline is already technically insolvent, without sufficient capital to fund its daily operations.
