South African Express (EXY, Johannesburg O.R. Tambo) says it is in the process of is preparing to lay fraud and corruption charges against "some" of its former executives.
Chairwoman Tryphosa Ramano said in a statement that SA Express's new board had taken the decision to charge the executives after a forensic investigation flagged a number of transactions which may have prejudiced the state-owned carrier of millions of rands prior to its temporary grounding in May 2018.
"The new Board of Directors of SA Express takes all allegations of impropriety by staff and other stakeholders of the airline very, very seriously," she said. “This is why the airline is taking this strong action because all allegations involving fraud, corruption and other irregularities demand a robust and prompt response, as well as the severest of sanctions against fingered parties."
The airline did not specify which transactions had been flagged stating only that they include multi-million rand cases of alleged collusion between the executives in question and service providers, manipulation of procurement processes, as well as the irregular and overpayment of suppliers.
Synonymous with the alleged rampant corruption that former South African president Jacob Zuma is now on trial for, SA Express said in its 2017/18 financial report to parliament that it had incurred 'irregular expenditures' to the tune of ZAR408 million rand (USD32.35 million at the time) as a result of employees not adhering to procurement processes.
In addition, The Sunday Times newspaper also exposed a three-year, ZAR2.4 billion (USD190.3 million) contract with EML Energy, owned by Pretoria-based music promoter Eldridge Motlhake, for the supply of jet fuel.
The controversial deal, for which SA Express's then-spokeswoman Refilwe Masemola said it had never received any product, was reportedly arranged by two of the airline's executives, Sam Vilakazi (then Chief Procurement Officer) and Merriam Mochoele (then General Manager: Legal, Risk and Compliance) without having gone to tender and without the knowledge of the board or management.
Motlhake has since denied any wrongdoing.
