The Democratic Alliance (DA) has launched an online campaign get South Africans to write to their bank to demand that they stop all further support for ailing South African Airways (SAA).
The party said it was ‘morally wrong’ for spending on SAA to be prioritised ‘over other far more urgent public spending priorities’.
It argued that ‘(part) of the reason SAA has been able to continue this long is thanks to the massive loans extended to SAA by South Africa’s major banks’.
‘Banks should know that in helping to bail out SAA, they do not have the support of the South African public and their clients.’
MP Geordin Hill-Lewis said in a statement the DA was ‘committed to mobilising all South Africans to stop the further use of public funds to bail out’ the national airline.
‘So many families have lost their jobs and livelihoods in recent months, and public services face massive cuts. To cut education, or healthcare, or social support at a time like this, to fund SAA, is indefensible.’
Even so, ‘we fully expect that the government will once again bail out SAA in next week’s mid-term budget’.
Ordinary South Africans, however, could act to curb the misallocation of funds.
Loans extended by the banks ‘are guaranteed by the government, and therefore by the public, who eventually have to pay them back’.
‘This is just a bailout by stealth. The extension of these loans is not ethical business practice by the major banks. They know they will turn an easy profit on a guaranteed loan, to a company that would never ordinarily qualify. This too must stop.’
The DA urged people to exert pressure on the banks to ‘stop all further support for SAA’ via a new webpage created for this purpose.
Hill-Lewis added: ‘South African banks are known for not lending money to entrepreneurs and small businesses. However, they have been comfortable in granting loans to bankrupt SAA because even if the airline defaults on payments, their loans to SAA are guaranteed by the government. And that means they are guaranteed by you, the public.’