LETTER: Pravin Gordhan must stop patronising SA about SAA bailout
Gordhan laments taxpayers’ callousness for not caring about SAA employees losing their jobs, but is it not ironic the rescue plan will render about 3,500 employees redundant?
I see public enterprises minister Pravin Gordhan refers to critics of the most recent SAA bailout as financially illiterate, and is apparently shocked by their lack of insight. He tells us that liquidation of the hapless SAA will cost R18.5bn. By inference, additional state funding of R10.5bn is therefore cheap at the price, and we should all support the purported "rescue".
A little over two months ago public enterprises director-general Kgathatso Tlhakudi wrote in these pages that a liquidation of SAA will cost the country between R30bn and R50bn (“Restructured SAA will boost aviation sector and act as a vital lifeline (https://www.businesslive.co.za/bd/opinion/2020-08-18-restructured-saa-will-boost-aviation-sector-and-act-as-a-vital-lifeline/),” August 18). So which is it — R18.5bn, R30bn or 50bn? The government has become so feckless with our money that a cost range of R31.5bn is perfectly acceptable...
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