South African Government to address 'far deeper challenges' at SAA

South Africa's Minister of Finance Malusi Gigaba said (04-Aug-2017) steps are being taken to address challenges faced by South African Airways (SAA), including measures to stabilise governance and protect liquidity. He stated: "There are far deeper challenges that we are facing at the airline that we need to address and some of those are just quick win decisions". Mr Gigaba said the carrier must address issues related to cash flow and liquidity, network, strategic use of aircraft, pilot incentive schemes and productivity, revenue management, IT systems, internal governance processes and business and commercial processes. The Government instructed the SAA board to handle cash flow and liquidity challenges "as a matter of urgency". Mr Gigaba said the pilot incentive scheme "costs the company enormously" and "remains a daunting challenge". The Government will announce "strategic decisions" to assist the airline as part of the 2017 Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement and Mr Gigaba added: "there are matters of the medium and long-term nature that the board has been instructed to take and that have been reported to me to be taken". [more - original PR]