New crisis as SAA suspends executives

South African Airways suspended the CEO of SAA Technical Musa Zwane and its chief financial officer, Phumeza Nhantsi, following unspecified allegations in a forensic investigation of the stateowned airline.

South African Airways (SAA) has suspended the CEO of SAA Technical, Musa Zwane, and its chief financial officer, Phumeza Nhantsi, after unspecified allegations against them in a forensic probe of the state-owned airline.

Zwane, who was acting CEO of SAA until November 2017, has been placed on leave pending a disciplinary hearing, SAA spokesman Tlali Tlali said on Tuesday. SAA would not comment further while the probe was in progress, he said.

MISMANAGEMENT

SAA appointed Vuyani Jarana as CEO in November 2017 to turn around the struggling airline, which has not made a profit since 2011 and needed a government bailout in 2017.

Under former chairwoman Dudu Myeni, the national carrier became embroiled in allegations of mismanagement and corruption that plagued the nine-year tenure of former president Jacob Zuma, who was replaced by Cyril Ramaphosa in February.

SAA’s board has resolved to institute disciplinary proceedings against two executives, Tlali said.

Nona Sonjani has been appointed as acting chief financial officer and Wellington Nyuswa as acting CEO of SAA Technical. Their appointments are to ensure business continuity following the suspension of Zwane and Nhantsi on Monday, said Tlali.

Tlali said the two suspended executives were still in the employ of the airline and were presumed innocent. He would not provide details of the charges against the executives.

QUALIFIED AUDIT

The suspensions followed a qualified audit report by the auditorgeneral, which was tabled in Parliament last week.

The report found, among other things, that SAA Technical’s inventory could not be verified and that there was a lack of controls to manage the inventory.

It also found the SAA Group’s assets were not being recorded in financial statements, while the existence of some assets recorded could not be verified.

The auditor-general’s report said there were glaring accounting irregularities on maintenance costs and that incorrect exchange rates had been recorded.

It found that the SAA Group had not established controls to maintain complete records of irregular and wasteful expenditure.