SAA pulls plug on BnP Capital
SOUTH African Airways yesterday ended its contract with BnP Capital, a financial advisory firm hired for the company’s restructuring of a R15billion debt.
Earlier this month, SAA said it had put that deal on hold to review the award of the contract to BnP Capital.
“After considering all relevant information received from BnP Capital, SAA management took a decision to terminate all BnP services to the airline as a prospective financial service provider in relation to SAA’s initiative on debt consolidation,” SAA said.
No-one at BnP Capital was immediately available to comment. SAA did not elaborate on the information received from BnP Capital following the state airline’s enquiries.
“No payments had been made to BnP Capital.
“The decision to terminate the service was arrived at after a review of the award to BnP Capital.”
Local media reported this month that the SAA board went against the advice of its own treasury by agreeing to pay BnP Capital a R256-million success fee to advise it on debt restructuring and fund raising without putting the contract out to tender.
The contract was awarded without tender due to urgent loan repayments due at the end of last month, SAA said.
SAA appointed BnP Capital as transactional advisor in March. SAA has been sustained by state guarantees of around R14.4-billion, and has asked Treasury for a further R5-billion. –