LETTER: Buffett’s exit from airlines a red flag for the government
Why is Pravin Gordhan propping up SAA when Warren Buffett is getting out of the collapsing sector?
Warren Buffett has sold Berkshire Hathaway’s airline holdings at a significant loss, saying that after Covid-19 the industry will never be the same again. Yet in SA the department of public enterprises owns two airlines.
SA Express is in liquidation and SAA is suspended in some form of liquidation limbo. But the department is determined to establish a “new” and “viable” SAA out of the ashes of the old one. Quite apart from the fact that the SA taxpayer will no doubt have to pay for this Phoenix, on current form what makes the department think it can succeed?
As Buffett himself said: “It’s when the tide goes out that you see who’s been swimming naked.” Since even he went skinny-dipping on this occasion, the mind boggles at what public enterprises minister Pravin Gordhan and his experts must have been up to.
James Cunningham
Camps Bay