By Thys Khiba
Johannesburg – The Young Communist League of South Africa (YCLSA) has reacted to the recent announcement by the Department of Public Enterprises (DPE) of the preferred Strategic Equity Partner (SEP) for the South African Airways (SAA) by accusing the airline business practitioners of being appointed for the sale of the airline and not to save the airline.
This comes after the Minister of Public Enterprises, Pravin Gordhan confirmed that Harith General Partners and Global Airways, which make up Takatso Consortium will own 51% of the SAA and the DPE will take 49%.
“On the 16th of May of 2020, the YCLSA in support of SCOPA stated that ‘it is not logically correct for the business rescue practitioners to claim that the airline cannot be rescued while they have not even presented the plan to rescue the airline and on the basis of the latter, it is clear that the business practitioners were appointed for the sale of the airline and not to save the airline,” said YCLSA National Spokesperson, Dloze Matooane.
The YCLSA said weeks after the appointment of the airline practitioners, the practitioners started to claim that the airline needed billions and the airline could not be saved, without presenting the basis for their claims. The YCLSA continued to say that the practitioners couldn’t present a plan to rescue the airline.
“Five months passed since their appointment and all that we witnessed was continued baseless rhetoric to liquidate the airline,” said Matooane.
According to the YCLSA, the announcements by the DPE are a clear indication that the South African’s policy direction, decision-making and leadership are ‘hellbent on intensifying an irrational neoliberal policy posture which is anti-development and places the country’s sovereignty on the hands of imperialist international finance institutions.’
“The 6th Administration under the disguise of ‘fighting against corruption,’ has decided to implement anti-progressive and development state agenda effectively and efficiently,” said Matooane.
According to the Gordhan, the new SAA will not be dependent on the fiscus. He said that it will be agile enough to cope with the current uncertainty, and improvement, in global travel.
“The partnership brings together South African public and private sector capabilities to reposition SAA. We have looked long and hard at the proposals submitted, and our clear choice of a preferred is the Takatso Consortium.
The objective of bringing in an equity partner to SAA is to augment it with the required technical, financial and operational expertise to ensure a sustainable, agile and viable South African airline,” said Gordhan.
“All revolutionaries as they pursue their revolutions know very well that privatisation of state assets as opposed to keeping them (and making them more effective and efficient), is actually an anti-thesis of the revolution,” said Matooane. @Free State Central News
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