South African Airways goes bankrupt affecting flights scheduled for Friday, Saturday

By Angella Semu

PRETORIA-(MaraviPost)-SAA fails to meet workers demands of 8% increase as a result of failure to make profits since 2011 which has resulted into workers going on strike and eventually canceled flights scheduled for Friday and Saturday.

A Union representing about 3,000 of its 5,000-member workforce said the strike would begin at 4 a.m.on Friday and go on indefinitely after a failed negotiation with the carrier. SAA said would offer 5.9% raise from April which didn’t resonate well with the workers demand of 8% increase.

Tlali Tlali, SAA spokesperson said the immediate increase in wages isn’t currently possible until the company secures enough funds and in mean time, only flights directly operated by SAA will be affected and not subsidiaries flights.

As quoted by Reuters, Tlali said: “We have a meeting scheduled for today at 2 o’clock and we are hopeful we will be able to resolve the issue … It will include all the unions … and if the meeting yields positive results we will then activate some contingency plans that will allow us to reinstate flights”.

Zazi Nsibanyoni-Mugambi, president of the South African Cabin Crew Association (SACCA) who is leading the strike with the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA), said the offer is unacceptable.

“They really need to get serious, 5.9% simply won’t cut it. It’s just over 1% more that we are asking for and we think its attainable, so last night we asked SAA (negotiators) to go and get a fresh mandate from management,” he said