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SCOPA blasts SAA for failure to present financial statements

Parliament’s Standing Committee on Public Accounts (SCOPA) has lambasted SAA for continued failure to present its 2017/18 and 2018/19 financial statements, accusing the struggling national airline of disregarding parliamentary processes.

The airline is required by law table its financial statements and annual reports before parliament and the committee on November 13 held a hearing into why the company had failed to comply.

The committee chaired by Mkhuleko Hlengwa said it was not entirely satisfied with the reasons provided by the flag carrier.  It then directed SAA to submit a legal opinion and other documents which influenced its decision not to submit the financial statements by no later than 12h00 last Wednesday, 20 November 2019.

"Despite further communication the committee made on 21 and 22 November 2019 reminding SAA to submit the documents, the committee has not received those documents."

“The committee finds this total disregard of parliamentary processes by the SAA unacceptable, as the conduct of the SAA board and management undermine parliament,” SCOPA said in a statement issued on Saturday.

The committee said the documents were required to prepare for a meeting scheduled for November 27 with SAA, the Auditor General, Department of Public Enterprises and National Treasury to develop a roadmap for the submission of the outstanding set of financial statements.

The planned meeting will go ahead as planned, it added.

On Wednesday, an SAA delegation told SCOPA that they were prevented from tabling the report as there are reservations whether the airline can be presented as a going concern, as Fin24 reported.

The cash-strapped entity on Friday came out of a crippling eight-day strike which grounded domestic and international flights and resulted in estimated financial loses of R50m per day. Workers including cabin crew were demanding 8% pay increases and rejected a plan by the airline to cut jobs.

The workers eventually agreed on a 5.9% increment and a plan to slash 944 jobs was temporarily put on hold. 

Despite the current challenges faced by the airline, SCOPA said it would not allow it “to willy-nilly determine its own rules for accountability.”

SAA has over the past 13 years incurred over R28bn in cumulative losses and is in the process of implementing its long-term turnaround strategy. It expects to break even by 2020/21. This year, Treasury approved a R5.5bn capital injection for SAA for the 2019/20 financial year.

The precarious financial position of the state-owned airline has forced it to delay payment of salaries for November, according to an announcement made this week.

On Saturday, SAA spokesperson Tlali Tlali said most routes had resumed operations following the end of the strike, except for the East London route which was expected to reopen on Sunday.

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