As far as Vernon and Nationwide are concerned, enough of a stink has been raised by various people over the Sun Air issue to give Nationwide holy cow status. The Competitions Board is in new hands, the ethics of which are beyond reproach, and which is keeping more than a beady eye on the activities of SAA and Comair. The DOT licencing councils are playing very much by the book with definately no favouritism given to SAA. Times have certainly changed. I have had numerous discussions with them and chances to enlighten them on the Sun Air circumstances.
Of Comair, they are in a better situation than ever before. Anyone who thinks that SAA pulled off this plot on their own probably believes that Coleman Andrews is innocent of any wrongdoing as well. If that is you, I doubt if you entered this website unassisted. Comair attempted to sell their 25% shareholding to SAA days/weeks before Sun Air's closure. They then entered discussions with SAA the contents of which one can only speculate, save to say that Comair relinquished their pre-emptive rights to purchase the other shareholders shares provided that they sold to SAA. There is no doubt that Comair knew that SAA would close the airline down and in fact desired it. In fact the Complaints Commission (now disbanded) only approved the sale if it was to be liquidated....bizare... At the first Sun Air shareholders meeting Comair actually proposed that Sun Air be liquidated volentarily. They quickly withdrew this proposal when legal council at the meeting explained the implications of proposing such a motion. I and the MD Sun Air were taken to task by Comair for revealing this fact. Comair's intentions for Sun Air were nevertheless made clear from the outset. When Comair gives their account of their involvement in Sun Air it is of course a one sided account which often neglects to mention some of the salient facts. For instance their proposal to merge Sun Air into one company was so grossly prejudicial to the rest of Sun Air shareholders that it was obviously unacceptable (I - lone sole - actually supported the merger at the time as I could see that without it Sun Air would be precariously positioned). The merger, almost a condition of privatisation, never took place. Comair used this as one of their excuses when explaining Sun Air's commercial ills. the "well we tried" excuse...yes but how hard. The truth is that any effort on the part of the Sun Air board to make commercial decisions to ensure the growth and success of Sun Air (eg expansion/diversificaation of routes, purchase of a/c etc) was thwarted at board level by the Comair/CNI contingent. This left Sun Air vulnerable to a SAA seat dumping exercise as seats were specifically dumped on the routes on which which Sun Air concentrated (CT, DN, JHB). The other airlines were not so adversely affected as their route diversification was somewhat more diverse. This was a fact explored and established in a DOT Licencing Council enqirey into Sun Air's cessation of operations. From the actions of both SAA and Comair since the closure of Sun Air it is almost impossible to believe that SAA and Comair did not forge some sort of an allience and agree to ensure Sun Air's demise and slice up the cake.
It is now common knowlege that Nationwide was presented a document to which Vernon was asked to be party to an agreement whereby Comair and SAA would slice up the cake and basically Vernon would be allowed to survive but (obviously to him) on crumbs. To his credit, he did not agree to this proposal (to my understanding despite ...for want of a better word... threats ...that his airline would follow Sun Air).
It is a fact that the rest of the Sun Air shareholders/shareholder directors were incompetent (except perhaps one Rethabele board member who warned the rest and was relieved of his post for his efforts) and the MD was way out of his depth, but the airline at it's closure was quite capable of being turned round in a very short space of time by competent management....even without recapitalisation. The spotlight on the SAA dealings was intensifying, and the price war was over. SAA could in fact not afford to continue with losses incurred in plotting Sun Air's demise for any longer into that financial year. Further SAA losses could not be as easily hidden as previously, (you will note that despite claims that they were running at a profit they later in fact admitted an over 100m rand loss), and the privatisation process had to go on whether SAA completed their elimination of Sun or not. The CNI and Comair appointees resigned from the Sun Board and were unlikely to take up their posts again. It remained for someone to buy the shares (KLM/Virgin ???). Now that is something Coleman Andrews was terrified of.....The airline was in enough good shape to scare him into ensuring it's demise under SAA control...ie buy it. Remember 3 months before Sun's closure Virgin had made a substantial offer for 25% of Suns shares. Comair thwarted this effort, and Rethabele tried to use this to play the field in a greedy attempt to make more. Coleman was quite right (as reflected in the SAA Board minutes). It was quite a strong possibility that a KLM or Virgin could buy the airline out of liquidation without the shareholders or SAA/Comair being able to do a damn thing about it (Judicial decision in the best interests of the employees and creditors). In fact Coleman knew that was the plan. So much for Coleman's continued misleading (to the ignorant public) allegations that it was obvious that Sun Air would have to close doors....Far from it. Despite being ill, it was market and operationally poised for enormous expansion and revitalisation.
The real nail in the coffin came with Government's attitude. It appeared (rightly or wrongly - you be the judge) that Government was in fact party to the demise of Sun Air. A sacrificial lamb to ensure the increase in value - and a handsome reward in the SAA privatisation stakes. Who knows, perhaps Government had every intention of allowing SAA to purchase Sun as planned, allowing a quiet winding up and achievement of all SAA and Comair objectives, but a party of employees got hold of a copy of the orriginal Share Sale Agreement and some other embarassing facts which caused them to reconsidder. The **** hit the fan.
What investor is going to go into the foray with Government's intentions so blatently obvious. Sun Air was a very attractive asset to buy...even out of liquidation. Those who had access to the real financial status of the airline were pleasantly surprised, compared to Comair and SAA's negative allegations...who was to know that a group of employees was going to access the books and that the evential liquidators would not be tame SAA appointees.
Rethabele just didn't have the nerve to talk on SAA from the start to end. If they had, they would have weathered the storm and survived. Now they have lost everything, with a R9m still to pay Gvmt for the original purchase of shares. By the time they eventially agreed to sell their shares to competent investors and the Staff consortium, the consortium had decided to aquire them by other means.
Instead of conducting business they (Rethabele) followed Borstlap into politicing with Andrews. I personally warned them (Borstlap and Makado) that they were being led up the garden path by Andrews. But they know more about business than I do. Weeks before I told a disbelieving body of pilots at Sun Air that I suspected that we were being sold into liquidation. If I could see it, and I was personna non gratia in the management circles, what the hell was Borstlap doing...blind, incompetent, or party to it all. He claims to have been excluded from the later negotiations. So that leaves Sheiks having the wool pulled over hs eyes alone. When you want to be important and be the boss....you better have balls and ability...not something in big supply at Sun Air.
Indecision, fence sitting, bet hedging and looking after personal position instead of just running the damn company with competence and good business sense. The Borstlap/Rethabele alliance (however fragile and strained) jointly and falsely still believed that they could still conduct business the Broederbond/Black Nepotism/Politically connected way.
Any questions.