Fixing SAA and SA tourism: ditch Beijing, promote 50p beers to travel-hungry Brits

When you’re Proudly South African, the silly economic decisions big state-funded enterprises and government ministers make get under your skin. South African CEO Chris Brewer, a popular blogger, takes aim this week at some of the moves – or lack thereof – by SAA and other South African tourism players. 

There are so many fantastic reasons to visit South Africa, not least of all that the weak currency makes a trip to explore its many attractions relatively cheap. Yet, we seem to be going out of our way to deter visitors. At the very least, we could be doing much more to promote the country, says Chris.

He unpacks the latest financials and goings on at SAA and has some advice for the Minister of Tourism. In a nutshell, Chris is calling for SAA to transfer to the private sector – and he is explaining to the powers-that-be why expanding ties with Nigeria is not the best use of resources.

Tell us whether you agree with Chris, by commenting below this piece.  – JC

Fixing SAA and SA tourism: ditch Beijing, promote 50p beers to the Brits

By Chris Brewer

Chris Brewer takes aim at SAA and Marthinus van Schalkwyk in his latest blog..
Chris Brewer takes aim at SAA and Marthinus van Schalkwyk in his latest blog..

Last week SAA announced their results from LAST year (March 2013) which says a lot about management efficiency in itself.

And, as you probably know, or could easily guess, they lost nearly a billion Rands in that year (by contrast, Comair is currently doubling its earnings). It’s also made a loss of R1.17 billion in the year to September.

So new CEO Monwabisi Kalawe (at least I think it’s him – it’s hard to keep up these days) made yet another pledge that through “aggressive cost management” the airline will be profitable “within the next four years.”

When he gets the chop, as he surely will if history is anything to go by, he could always become a stand-up comedian because that’s just about the funniest thing I’ve ever heard.

I’ve said it before, the airline has to be sold to a company that knows what it’s doing because ever since Coleman Andrews made SAA unmanageable, and walked of with a MASSIVE “bonus”, it’s made one stupid blunder after another. In real life no proper CEO would be allowed to get away with it.

Here’s a couple of examples of what I mean. SAA’s idea of “cost management” was to stop all direct flights between Cape Town and London and sell off an incredibly valuable time slot at Heathrow Airport. It’s unfortunate that this was done little more than a year before the New York Times voted Cape Town as being the “most desirable city to visit in the world.”

In the meantime, British Airways are busy laying on another three flights per week to the Cape. Why? Because the demand is so high and they’re making big profits! When my friends at BA heard the news about cutting out Cape Town they literally jumped for joy. Honestly. “It’s like SAA just gave us 100,000 new customers”.

Did Kalawe’s predecessors ever stop to think what they were doing? (Or was it more sinister than that and they were “instructed” to do it by others? Ssshhh I won’t say a word.) What is obvious is that he’s got a tough job and, taking the sanguine option, he’s promising future profits.

But, oh dear me, he’s not off to a very good start is he? Now they’re going to shut down the Buenos Aires route – so that’s another few thousand hotel rooms not being sold to Argentinians.

But, guess what, the route that loses the most money for SAA (R300m every year) is Beijing. Apparently Kalawe says they were “thinking” of withdrawing from the China route “but decided against it.” But that’s only part of the story. The REAL reason is that Public Enterprises Minister Malusi Gigaba was determined to keep that “very strategic route” open.

Well, of course he would demand that because Number One would have told him to. After all, this government’s doing everything it can (along with other African countries) to sell the entire continent to the Chinese. Of course they must have planes to and from Beijing. God forbid they should have to come via Nigerian Airways.

All Monwabisi Kalawe has to do is keep his masters happy for another year or two, try and hide the losses somewhere in the meantime, and when he’s relieved of his position he can take his “performance bonus” (or whatever they call it) of many millions and go on holiday for a long, long time.

Oh yes, and Mr. Kalawe wants you and I (the taxpayers), via his boss Malusi Gigaba, to give the airline more money (on top of the R5 billion guarantee) so that it can continue with its “aggressive cost management”.

How long can this government continue to pour money into businesses they don’t know anything about? How much longer will we allow our taxes to be squandered?

Maybe the election will reveal something. Maybe pigs will fly.

AND ANOTHER THING

As I write this, the Rand is 18.5 to 1 against Sterling. So which London agency has been briefed to produce a campaign to get Brits to visit SA? Something along the lines of “for 50p you can buy a beer in a very nice pub” or “a really good night out in a top quality restaurant, including fillet steak and excellent local wine” for less than ten quid each!”

That’s what our Minister of Tourism (Marthinus van Schalkwyk isn’t it?) should be doing – and I’m sure of it. They must be. Cape Town is the darling of the tourist world right now and the exchange rate makes it the cheapest holiday ever for a Brit. So they must be getting a good Ad Agency onto it. Mustn’t they?

Oh, but wait, yes of course, any decision like that will have to be debated at great length and Ministers will have to visit the UK several times to speak to their counterparts. And, in any event, SAA can’t fly visitors direct to Cape Town anymore.

Come to think of it, forget I ever mentioned it.

Anyway, Marthinus is far too busy opening SA’s newest tourism office in…..wait for it….Lagos! (The homophobic capital of the world and centre for human rights denial of course).

Yes, at the time SAA made its announcement about losing money this ex failed party leader was opening the champagne in a part of the world that he sees as having big tourism potential.

It’s rubbish of course. What’s happening is that there are about half a dozen war zones in the area and SA wants to make sure we can offload some of our own weaponry there – bugger the tourists.

Of course, tourism from Nigeria is definitely increasing (but I suspect not quite as fast as the refugees). After all, 73,282 Nigerian tourists visited SA last year. (Sadly the amount of cash they spent here dropped over the previous year – so not a good trend really).

But, be honest now, can you see yourself relaxing under a coconut tree on one of Nigeria’s beaches for your next holiday? Personally I think I’d rather take my chances doing a spit roast pig in Afghanistan.

For pity’s sake, will someone please tell him to ask his boss, Jacob Zuma, what the numbers really are? Listen up Marty…438,023 Brits visited here in 2012 (during which the SAA flights to Cape Town stopped in August), 326,643 came from the USA. The number of South Americans doubled over the previous year. What the hell are you messing around in Nigeria for – or are you just naturally doff?

The only answer is free enterprise. Let proper businessmen run SAA.

Chris Brewer is CEO of Brewers Data Services, which manages on-line database Apps of all advertising agencies, major advertisers and all media in South Africa. His blog, Brewer’s Droop, is republished here on Biznews.com with his kind permission.

For more by Chris Brewer read:

Bitcoins: Virtual money of the future or just an amazing scam?

Fat and happy: Get used to your flab because diets don’t work – experienced SA dieter

 

 

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