You are witnessing a tug of war between Emirates and Dixon, Carnegie, singleton et al. Who want to take it private.
Alan Joyce was deliberately chosen to make things worse, not better. That much is blindingly obvious. The corporate strategy constructed by Joyce and endorsed by the Board was a complete failure from the start. Anyone, in business knows that "foreigners" are carefully skinned in Chinese markets, they have been doing it since at least as early as 1935 by my late fathers recollections. the story is always the same - huge population and growing markets. But somehow the joint ventures always fail, costing the Westerners all their capital, and the Chinese partner always cleans up. funny that.
To put that another way, what did you expect when a know nothing Irishman goes up against the Middle Kingdom??? I have said this from the start.
Carnegie, Dixon, Singleton et al will no doubt have a master plan to renovate the Qantas brand that will be in place a microsecond after they get control.