South African Airways business rescue practitioners have rejected an “unvetted” statement released by the state-owned airline indicating plans to resume domestic flights from mid-June.
The national carrier had on Tuesday, announced that its planes will be back in the skies between Johannesburg and Cape Town.
But Les Matuson and Siviwe Dongwana, the business rescue administrators, say the airline had breached communications protocol by issuing a statement which “created an unfair expectation on our relevant stakeholders, including SAA’s customers, as well as employees who are on unpaid absence as a result of the travel ban which led to the halting of the company’s operations, compounding its financial distress.”
SAA’s media statement had gone out without the approval of the practitioners as demanded by the business rescue procedure.
With the government of South Africa announcing that the country will enter into lockdown alert level 3 from June 1, domestic air travel will be permitted but only for business purposes.
The business rescue practitioners said SAA planes will remain grounded until a better understanding of what the level 3 regulations entail.