The Citizen (KZN)

DA, Tito to pay own costs for SAA funding litigation

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The high court has ruled that both parties are to pay their own costs, after an applicatio­n by the DA that sought to block Finance Minister Tito Mboweni from bailing out SA Airways (SAA) using his emergency powers started “with a bang and ended with a whimper”.

The two-part applicatio­n, launched in mid-July, was removed from the roll.

In a short but scathing judgment, Judge Norman Davis wrote: “[This] urgent applicatio­n started with a bang and ended with a whimper.

“It kicked off with allegation­s of constituti­onal impropriet­y being levelled against the minister of finance and ended with a simple costs argument.”

Davis said that while the DA had acknowledg­ed “interdicto­ry relief, at least on an urgent basis”, once it received a response from Mboweni to its questions – and while it had sought to have the matter removed from the roll – the urgent roll had already been amended to accommodat­e the matter, and time devoted to reading the papers.

It would be “unfair” to burden another court with a dispute over the costs order, the judge said.

He therefore split the cost between the two parties, adding that they were “equally to blame”. Escalation could have been avoided had the DA not “jumped the gun” and had the minister provided a “simple explanatio­n”, he said.

“Transparen­cy on the part of the minister rather than taunting ‘tweets’ would have prevented further litigation.” But Davis added that the DA had rushed to court “without factual basis”.

The ruling was made late in July, after arguments were heard via Microsoft Teams. SAA went into business rescue in December 2019, following years of losses and repeated state bailouts.

Months later, SAA creditors voted to proceed with its proposed business rescue plan. However, a condition of the plan requires government or a strategic equity partner to provide an additional R10.3 billion in funding.

This prompted the DA to write to Mboweni, asking whether he had authorised use of funds from the National Revenue Fund for any purpose relating to SAA in terms of section 16 of the Public Finance Managing Act – which gives the minister powers to authorise the use of these funds in emergency situations.

The DA gave the minister a deadline to respond the same day. When they did not receive a response by the deadline, which Mboweni described as unreasonab­le, they attempted to interdict the minister from using the funds. – News24 Wire

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