By Neelam Rahim

There is outrage after Comair announced the suspension of British Airways and Kulula flights on the same that day it offered a special deal of 30% off the ticket price. The company said it was forced to suspend flights because of lack of funding, some experts believe this will signal the death for the airline with no apparent funding channels in sight.

Radio Islam discusses with Phakamile Hlubi Majola who is the spokesperson for Numsa the largest union at Comair,

“A job bloodbath been a very real fear surrounding the announcement yesterday where the union will be suspending all operations and the reason for doing so is because it doesn’t have enough money to keep the planes up in the air. That for us is a big worry, particularly because we had a very frustrating meeting with management this morning where we discussed the situation and unfortunately there’s a lot of uncertainty relating to the future of these airlines. The worries and concerns around job losses are very valid.”

Phakamile says, “There was not much progress made after the meeting since they are still in the dark concerning important things. We all know that Comair is in financial distress and are told that the business rescue practitioner is in the process of trying to find a possible investor to inject funding into the airline. We asked how much funding does Comair require, we were not given an answer and were told that information is confidential. We have asked questions surrounding the suspension and there too with no answers we are given vague responses instead of direct explanations on the situation at hand hence we sit in a situation of very deep uncertainty.”

In March the airline’s operating certificate was temporarily suspended because of safety issues. We’ve been struggling under this leadership and business rescue practitioner. We wonder if they have any value to play in terms of turning this airline around. My understanding is that between one to two thousand people are employed by Comair at this time as there was a retrenchment process that took place just before 2020.

Phakamile also suggests that the best way forward for this company facing financial distress is to reach out to its workers and work together with unions to find a solution.