The party believes Mboweni ‘unlawfully’ used the emergency provisions of the PFMA to release funding for the airline’s rescue.
The Democratic Alliance has filed an urgent application to interdict Finance Minister Tito Mboweni’s authorisation of funds for South African Airways’ restructure using his emergency powers under Section 16 of the Public Finance Management Act .
Proceeding under the assumption that Mboweni has invoked this section DA finance spokesperson Geordin Hill-Lewis has asked the court for an interim interdict to stop the minister’s emergency authorisation to use public funds to fully or partly fund the rescue plan pending a review of the decision. The DA argues that it has a “clear, alternatively prima facie, right to an interdict” because the use of Section 16 is “clearly unlawful” as the requirements laid out in the section do not apply to SAA’s case.Lewis-Hill said there was no emergency that warranted the “extraordinary shortcutting of usual appropriation processes” as the company had been in financial decline for over a decade.
He noted that the government had “ample” opportunities to appropriate this money through normal processes in the February budget and when the supplementary budget was presented in June after the final rescue plan had been published. Whereas, providing the interim interdict to block the authorisation, release and use of funding would not cause any harm to SAA or the government as a provision for delays are built into the rescue plan.
Should the application be unsuccessful Hill-Lewis said he and the DA would be entitled to “Biowatch protection” which shields parties from adverse cost orders when fighting for their rights against the state.
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