MANGO ceo, Nico Bezuidenhout has confirmed that he has resigned to head up a European airline.
In an exclusive interview with Travel News, Nico confirmed that his resignation was effectively immediately and that he would take up his new post in Europe from November 1. He declined to name his new employer, which, he said, would be made in a separate announcement on Thursday.
Nico said his decision to relocate was not new. “I have been looking for international exposure for a number of years and this has now come across my path. Recent happenings in the aviation industry may have contributed to a small extent, but it has been my plan all along.” While his departure is imminent, he will be available to provide support when needed. He said the Mango board would advise in due course who would be taking over the reins at the airline.
Nico stressed his decision was “100% and categorically” not a reflection on the financial state of Mango. Although not in business rescue like its mother firm SAA, Mango needs R1bn in recapitalisation. Nico confirmed that Mango had not been profitable for the last three years, despite a low cost base. He said Mango had received no indication yet from its shareholder, the Department of Public Enterprises, when the promised funding for the carrier would be forthcoming, as envisaged in terms of the SAA business rescue plan. “Basically, what you have seen in the media has been the same consistent narrative from the DPE,” he said.
He said Mango had been operating at about 6% of its normal seat capacity since restricted domestic flights were reintroduced under Level 3 in June. However, sales had surged four-fold in the last few days since all domestic travel restrictions were lifted under Level 2. “This is encouraging, however we don’t know yet if this is just an initial rush and if these demand levels can be sustained.”
He said Mango had been unable to cover its normal infrastructure costs during lockdown. While the airline was contributing to its running overheads, it was not making any profits. “In terms of the current performance, the business is performing better than expected, but bottom-line profitablility does not exist at the moment. But then, I don’t know any airline in the world where it does at present.” He added: “Mango pays for its services that it consumes on an ongoing basis. What we are not paying right now and what is related to the SAA business rescue plan, is the historic debt.”
He said Mango’s 795 employees had been on reduced salaries since the start of the lockdown. Lowest level employees were receiving close to full salaries (being a combination of UIF TERS and salaries paid by the airline), while senior employees, management and pilots had suffered substantial pay cuts. He said this had been in line with a decision by employees to band together to save the airline, rather than opting for restructuring and retrenchments. He said trade unions had played a constructive role and had been supportive of measures taken by the company during the lockdown.
Responding to reports of air safety reports (ASR) filed by Mango pilots in the past week, he said these were standard practice and could relate to anything that pilots were unhappy about. “To my knowledge there has been no single incident of aircraft maintenance-related ASR.”
He said two of Mango’s fleet of 14 B737-800s were scheduled to be returned to lessors before COVID-19 and would now return at the end of August. “The company doesn’t need that many aircraft in the short term, but if the demand of the last couple of days continues, the situation may change. Mango has also secured a number of regional route rights, which the company could pursue in due course when regional travel reopens.”
On Mango’s future he said: “What the long-term situation is going to be, that I don’t know, because we are intertwined with the whole SAA business rescue. But as we stand now, flights are operating and passengers are being taken safely to their destinations. The sales are picking up and the shareholder has gone on record stating that it will support the SAA Group.”
Nico is the third executive to depart from Mango, with the cfo and director of Flight Operations having left recently for personal reasons.
He has held the reins at Mango twice, first as founding ceo for 10 years between 2006 and 2016, and again for the past year since October 2019.
In between, he also acted as group ceo of SAA. He also ran low-cost carrier, Fastjet, between October 2016 and September 2019, and is credited as the founder of South Africa’s first e-ticketing service, Ticketweb, in 1998.
Nico’s appointments at Mango were not without controversy, with questions repeatedly raised over his lack of formal qualifications. Within days of Nico re-joining the airline last year, Mango, SAA and Comair were grounded by SACAA relating to issues at SAA Technical. A month later, SAA employees went on strike, which meant Mango had to carry all SAA passengers. On December 5, SAA went into business rescue; and in March, all air travel stopped as South Africa went into lockdown because of COVID-19.
