South African Airways (SA, Johannesburg O.R. Tambo) is expected to reduce flights ahead of a recapitalisation later this year, reports Moneyweb. The business news site claims to have seen internal planning schedules showing that 175x weekly flights will be cut starting in October.
The cut destinations include Brazzaville and Pointe Noire (Republic of the Congo), and Libreville Leon M'Ba (Gabon), while flights from Johannesburg O.R. Tambo to Durban King Shaka, Cape Town International and East London could be reduced.
A report by Netwerk24 – which was vehemently criticised, but not denied, by South African Airways spokesman Tlali Tlali – suggested that other cut destinations could be: Blantyre and Lilongwe in Malawi, Kinshasa N'Djili in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Kigali in Rwanda. Netwerk24 also claimed that East London and Port Elizabeth routes will be served by South African Airlink (Johannesburg O.R. Tambo) instead.
South African Airways did not immediately respond to ch-aviation for comment.
Meanwhile, the government is due to decide how to recapitalise the ailing airline by the end of September.
"Before the end of September, we should have gone to cabinet, proposed the options and cabinet should have taken the decision," Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba told reporters last week. "What is a fact is that there is a ZAR10 billion (USD766 million) capitalisation that is required for South African Airways but the source or model of that recapitalisation is not yet finalised."
Cabinet is considering whether to sell off its stake in telecommunications company Telkom to help pay for the bailout of South African Airways.
