F**K The CLient
Iwouldn't touch them with someone elses barge pole. They are unsrcupluous, unprofessional and going broke. Like the man said, 'Maybe not today, maybe not tommorrow but someday soon and for the rest of thier lives.'
South Africa is wonderful, the experience is great but go to a school with a desreved reputation. 43 Air, Lanseria Flight Centre, Central Flying Academy and many others are all fairly well establsihed operators who are not JAA.
This may initially appear to provide a problem and if you are completely new to avaiation I would much recommend the safety of USA or Jerez to go straight to JAA. However the option remains to get a South African CPL/ME/IR and then convert on return to UK.
As the holder of a professional licence you will not need the CPL course only a test and you need to do 15 hours in JAA airspace (10 can be in a FNPT2 or 5 in a FNPT1) and then 170a and test.
This could save you a bit of cash, means that you have the ability to work in Africa should you choose to stay and try and raise some hours (SA license accepted pretty much all over Africa).
It will further mean that you have contributed to not supporting the rip off merchants FTC who really do just take your money and F**K The Client.
Hope you choose well, it may cost you your life if you don't.
VT