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Credentials of Air Botswana partners under strict scrutiny
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THE FINANCIAL health of Air Botswana's preferred suitor in the company's privatisation flight, SA Airlink, has raised a number of informed eyebrows.
Negotiations are currently at an advanced stage to give the South African company close to a 50% stake (an estimated 49.9%) in Air Botswana. |
And according to a press statement released two months ago by the chairman of Air Botswana's Board of Directors, Mpho
Mothibatsela: "Airlink will be responsible for managing the business".
However, two major South African financial institutions, Nedbank and Coronation Fund Management, have controlling shares in SA Airlink. The South African organisations acquired the shares through the conversion of loans into equity after the airline failed to service its loans. A source from one of the South African banks who preferred anonymity confirmed that "SA Airlink couldn't pay us back the money we had loaned them, so we converted our loan into equity".
Air Botswana's general manager, Lance Brogden, said that he was aware of the matter though he did not know the full details. Sceptics in the country, however, question the wisdom of handing over the national carrier to an aviation company with uncertain credentials with regard to management of its own finances.
Alarmingly, sources reveal that lending institutions were left with no option but to convert their loans into equity. There are questions about whether the many hundreds of millions of Pula that the government has spent on Air Botswana would go towards settling the debt of the proposed partner. Air Botswana last got financial assistance from the government in the early 90s. Previously, efforts to get a commercial partner for Air Botswana failed with Comair and Air Mauritius.
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