SAA came very close to liquidation. And someone was waiting in the wings to take over the national carrier The scheme to hijack South Africa’s national carrier financially has since crashed and burned, thanks to the heroics of Nene, Gordhan and others. Nevertheless the implications of what was attempted needs to be understood, as the ramifications are profound.Pre-flight checkIn 2002, SAA entered into a purchase agreement with Airbus to acquire A320-200 aircraft. From a total order of 20x A320s, the first ten were delivered in 2013. But in order to defray costs, SAA immediately sold the aircraft - with the approval of Airbus - to Pembroke (the aviation division of Standard Chartered, an international bank) and then SAA leased the aircraft back [1].The final order of 10x A320s were set to be delivered between 2015 and 2017, with a series of pre-delivery payments falling due. Prior to delivery of the aircraft, SAA was endemically cash-strapped, and so was struggling to fulfil its obl...
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