Uncertain of the future of a revamped South African Airways, over 3,000 SAA workers have decided to take the money offered in a “voluntary severance package” and run to the bank with it, their unions said on Thursday.
The SAA is under the care of a group of government-appointed business practitioners who are trying to restructure it and send it back into the air.
This process, however, has earned little confidence from the workers who have gone months without pay and were now looking forward to the voluntary severance packages agreed to last month, the unions said.
The SAA’s business practitioners dangled “voluntary severance packages” for any staff member willing to jump ship before they are pushed off the 4,777-member staff payroll list.
These packages range from guaranteed payments of US$21,000 per employee, and up to US$118,000 each for pilots, according to the unions.
As part of the plan, some 1,000 employees would be retained to run the restructured national airline, they said.
A total of 3,142 employees have applied for the voluntary severance packages – leaving the business practitioners with another headache: filling the gap with new and trained employees.
The unions said the reason for the high number of staff wishing to leave the SAA was due to the workers having been unpaid salaries for the past four months and were now struggling to survive under the coronavirus lockdown.
NM/jn/APA