Jacob Zuma with ex-SAA chairwoman Dudu Myeni during his visit at Airways Park on May 06, 2016 – (Photo by Gallo Images / Sunday Times / Kevin Sutherland)
How Dudu Myeni’s WhatsApp message cost SAA a R1.4 billion deal
Court hears that a lucrative deal between SAA and Emirates airlines was scuppered at the last minute by Dudu Myeni and, allegedly, Jacob Zuma.
Jacob Zuma with ex-SAA chairwoman Dudu Myeni during his visit at Airways Park on May 06, 2016 – (Photo by Gallo Images / Sunday Times / Kevin Sutherland)
Former South African Airways chairperson Dudu Myeni sank a beneficial deal between the embattled airline, which has since been placed in business rescue, and Emirates Airlines at the eleventh hour in 2015, the North Gauteng High Court heard on Monday.
The national carrier’s former CEO, Nico Bezuidenhout, told the court that Myeni pulled the deal mere hours before an official signing in Paris.
He was testifying in a court application by the Organisation Against Tax Abuse (OUTA) and the SAA Pilots Association (SAAPA) to have Myeni declared a delinquent director. The two organisations have to a large extent based their application on the fate of the deal with Emirates.
Court documents revealed last week that in January 2015, Emirates approached SAA “with a proposal for an enhanced commercial relationship”.
Read: Dudu Myeni appeal dismissed, irritated Judge Tolmay orders trial to begin
SAA code-sharing relationship valued at R1.4 billion
The benefits of the proposed deal included an expanded code-sharing relationship and an annual revenue guarantee of $100m (R1.4 billion), which would have supported SAA in operating a profitable daily service between Johannesburg and Dubai.
But, Bezuidenhout told the court, many attempts to get the deal approved failed.
He said he wrote numerous emails to Myeni, and these included giving her the opinion of aviation industry experts who supported the deal. Bezuidenhout said the rest of Myeni’s board members also supported the deal.
He testified that he left for France on June 14, 2015 to sign the deal two days later. The date was chosen to coincide with the Paris Airshow – the biggest aviation showpiece – and both parties hoped that a large media contingent would cover the inking of the contract.
However, the day before the signing, he was obliged to inform his Emirates counterparts “that I still did not get permission to sign the deal”.
They then told him that they would escalate the matter right to then president Jacob Zuma.
“The next morning I got a call from Ms Myeni at about 2am. She was furious and accused [me] of having embarrassed the country and the president.”
She told him that the Emirates people had contacted the president.
Dudu Myeni calls deal off via WhatsApp message
“Later on, she said I should not sign the deal. She also said the president did not want me to sign the deal. I never heard the president saying it but Ms Myeni mentioned the president’s name,” Bezuidenhout said.
He said seven hours later, Myeni allegedly sent a WhatsApp to him and instructed him not to execute the deal.
“I then took the WhatsApp message and circulated to some of the officials who accompanied me to Paris for the signing of the deal,” Bezuidenhout said.
He told the court that the cabin crew members were already dressed up for the occasion when the message landed on his cellphone.
Bezuidenhout was due to return to the stand on Tuesday.
SAA went into business rescue in early December. The airline has accrued cumulative losses of R28 billion over the past 13 years.
Myeni served as chairperson from 2012 to 2017. She is widely seen as a close confidante of Zuma.
By African News Agency (ANA), Editing by Naomi Mackay
