Durban - Thousands of retrenched SAA employees who have not been paid since April have lost their homes and cars as they wait for their severance packages, which they had opted for to escape the debt trap.
This despite the fact that in Finance Minister Tito Mboweni’s R10.5 billion bailout for SAA, R2.2bn had been set aside to fund retrenchment packages.
Unions yesterday said former employees were no closer to being told exactly when they would be paid out. SA Cabin Crew Association chief negotiator Feroze Kader said yesterday that many employees who had opted to take voluntary retrenchment had done so because they expected to be paid their severance packages on August 31, but this had not transpired. He said about 3 480 of SAA’s 4 700 staff had taken severance packages or been subjected to the section 189 retrenchment process.
The association represents 70% of SAA’s cabin and ground crew.
“Every single SAA employee, bar some management, executive management and the board, has not been paid since April. We have been living on Covid-19 Ters – which stopped on September 15. Employees who were living on R25 000 a month have been trying to survive on between R4 000 and R6 000 a month,” Kader said.
He said employees were dealing with high levels of debt and depression.
“Their houses were taken and they couldn’t afford rentals and had to move into family homes. They have been listed on the credit bureaus and they are having issues with municipal bills and school fees. The understanding of the majority of unions was that date of payment was supposed to be August 31, so there were people who took voluntary severance packages out of the plight of debt, which would have made them able to come out of debt, but the government did not provide the funds on time.”
Kader said a total of 1 320 staff, which included ground staff and cabin crew, as well as pilots and 88 managers, remained as employees, and negotiations with the Department of Public Enterprises were ongoing.
He said about 300 staff would enter a one-year lay-off training scheme, funded through the sector, education and training authorities, and the Unemployment Insurance Fund.
“We had eight sessions with the CCMA and we are still negotiating with management. We are now trying to talk to the government to pay the voluntary severance packages because there is no food on some tables,” Kader said.
“I have been with the airline for 26 yeas and I have never seen desperate employees and a brand that is dead – that was killed by government and bad leadership, from the board down to management,” Kader said.
SAA Pilots’ Association chairperson Captain Grant Back said SAA had 617 pilots, of which 80 had previously agreed to leave temporarily to work on contract for Emirates and Etihad airlines, to reduce costs for SAA.
He said 325 pilots had accepted the severance package.
“No one has received any funds, and part of the severance package agreement, in small print, was that the funding would have to be made available, so even though they have had access to their pension funds, the company has not kept its side,” he said. He said SAA told the association on Friday that it would apply to the CCMA for a lockout, claiming it could not pay pilots who remained employed and were available for duty. A Durban pilot, who asked not to be named, said his last flight had been on March 20, and he was last paid in April.
He said he did not know how he was going to pay his children’s school and university fees for 2021. “I have applied everywhere for work, but the aviation sector has stopped. It will take a turn, but maybe only in another year or two. It is absolutely disgusting how we have been treated after many years of loyal service,” he said.
Louise Brugman, the spokesperson for SAA’s business rescue practitioners Siviwe Dongwana and Les Matuson, said yesterday that R2.2bn of the R10.5bn in funding would be used to pay voluntary severance packages and section 189 retrenchment packages, while R2bn would go to working capital, R800 million to trade creditors, R3bn for unblown ticket liabilities, R1.7bn for aircraft leases, and R600 million for other creditors. She said SAA had asked for R10.3bn in the plan to fund these costs. Asked when packages would be paid out, she said: “We are still assessing the detail of the funding,” and declined to comment further.
National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) spokesperson Phakamile Hlubi-Majola welcomed the R10.5bn injection.
“We had hoped the capital injection would come sooner to limit the untold suffering which workers and their families have endured in the process. This funding came at great cost to workers at SAA. “They have lost out on at least eight months of their income because of the long drawn-out business rescue process.”
The Mercury