Leber - a first class summation there - well done. Cast your mind back 18 years ago this month and you have exactly the same thing that happened to Freddie Laker.
Personally, I feel that the so-called 'empowerment' companies such as Thebe Investments (which owns SAX and belongs to the ANC - Thabo Mbeki is/was a trustee) and Rethabile are an absolute scam, usually being set up by well connected ANC 'cadres' and being financed by the major banks eager to keep their sticky fingers in various pies. They are reminiscent of the worst excesses of the Nats - such as the Trust Bank 'lifeboat' using taxpayers money offered by none other than our late and unlamented Governor of the Reserve Bank, Chris Stals. Indeed, one European Central Bank head once described ABSA as "more corrupt than BCCI" - and that's saying something!
On the subject of bankers, Kubota, one of my favourite ads in terms of incredibly inept
PR management was ABSA's ad showing a 'retired Swiss banker' saying "I love Absa. They make me feel as if I was right at home". Given that it came out at the same time as the revelations about the Jewish accounts, what does *that* say about ABSA?
It will be interesting to see what happens with Vernon and his application to fly to London. As we all know, African disaStar was given its approvals in double-quick time - despite the fact that its CEO, Ben Kirama (which isn't his real name anyway - see the African Star thread)- is still out on bail on a multi-hundred million rand VAT fraud charge. Vernon was refused permission to wet lease a Virgin A340 on the somewhat 'iffy' grounds that he was just fronting for VS and that they were trying to get extra frequencies via the back door.
Vernon was absolutely right to decline the SA/MN 'carve-up': Rodger Foster was offered a similar deal if he helped SA get rid of Flitestar (which was the reason he bought the ATR42s) but instead SA shafted him and brought in Bill Deluce and the ANC (through Thebe Investments) in the form of SAX. Rodger and Barry have now been relegated to third place at the SAA table with SA Airlink and the Jetstream 41s.
Looking on the bright side, though, SA must be running scared now that BA has bought shares in MN. It is ironic that MN, which was SA's 'Frankenstein's Monster' in the form of Citijet - created by SA to attack Flitestar, with cheap aircraft and crews - is now SA's strongest competitor.
And there, I think, was the real reason BV was murdered - neither MN nor SA really wanted or could handle a 'Virgin South Africa'.
Unfortunately, if the OSEO goes after Andrews, it's also going to have to go after Sheiks, Bert van der Linden, Piet van der Hoeven, Nik Vlok, etc etc. Bortlap appears to have just been grossly incompetent, but hey, we've got plenty of precendent for that in SA - Gert van der Veer, Jan Blake, etc etc!
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Happiness is VR at Lagos!