South African Airways (SA, Johannesburg O.R. Tambo) acting CEO Nico Bezuidenhout has rejected a report carried by Bloomberg news alluding to secretive talks with Air China (CA, Beijing Capital) and Hainan Airlines (HU, Haikou). The report had claimed South African airline officials had held preliminary talks with their Chinese counterparts over a possible partnership which could be a precursor to a possible to a Chinese stake acquisition in the struggling airline.

Speaking at a press conference in Johannesburg last week, Bezuidenhout told the media that no such talks had taken place.

“Categorically, SAA is not in any talks with any airline to sell itself at the moment,” he was quoted by South Africa's Engineering News. “We’re not engaged with Air China in terms of selling a stake to Air China.”

He did, however, confirm that some interest had been shown in three of the airline units which have been slated for privatization namely catering firm Air Chefs which has been linked to BidVest, a local investment holding company with interests in the foodservice industry, and budget carrier Mango Airlines (MNO, Johannesburg O.R. Tambo).

Given Mango's strong record of profitability, the SAA board was considering taking the airline public as this could help reduce the carrier's perennial dependency on state-backed guarantees.

MRO services provider SAA Technical, whose last attempt at finding a suitable buyer/partner in 2012 failed, has also attracted some interest with proposals to expand its business further into Africa.

Bezuidenhout said that the board would make its recommendations to the airline's sole shareholder, the South African government, later this month with a decision due by the end of June.

The airline is set to embark on its Long-Term Turnaround Strategy (LTTS) having completed a 90-Day Action Plan at the end of March. The short-term plan sought to cut ZAR1.25 billion (USD107.3 million) in expenditure from SAA's current budget. As such, Treasury has now appointed international accounting firm Deloitte to help fine tune the LTTS.

Pretoria hopes to transform SAA into a profitable, self-sustaining entity which would eliminate its near total reliance on the national fiscus which has brought strong criticism from private operators which argue that state-funding severely distorts the local market.

Meanwhile Robert Watson, a Johannesburg businessman, has filed a petition in a Johannesburg High Court seeking ZAR1 billion (USD82.6 million) in damages from SAA alleging it had orchestrated the failure of domestic carrier Sun Air (South Africa) (Johannesburg Lanseria) during its first incarnation back in 1999.

Back then SunAir, which operated between Johannesburg and Cape Town, was run by Comair (South Africa) (CAW, Johannesburg O.R. Tambo) which had planned to sell a 75% stake in the airline to SAA retaining only a minority shareholding of 25%. However, SAA withdrew its offer leading to Sunair's collapse.

Watson owns SunAir's outstanding claims filed against SAA after the airline's black empowerment partners Rethabile Leisure and Tourism ceded them to him prior to their liquidation.

According to BusinessDay, Watson is claiming a percentage of the profits made by SAA on the lucrative Durban King Shaka, Johannesburg O.R. Tambo, and Cape Town International routes from 2000 to 2003, following Sun Air's collapse.

In 2005, Sun Air's liquidators took SAA to court claiming SAA and top executives, including then-CEO Coleman Andrews, his then-deputy André Viljoen and Johannes van Jaarsveld, then-executive vice-president for operations, had plotted to seize control of struggling SunAir and then deliberately shut it down.

SAA eventually paid the liquidators ZAR14.5 million (USD1.23 million in 2005 Dollars) in a full and final settlement without admission of liability on the part of SAA.