RESPONSE TO DA MEMBER’S STATEMENT PERTAINING TO THE OPEN WATER AUDIT REPORT ON SAAT CONTRACT

The article in PoliticsWeb.co.za entitled “Answers needed on SAAT Bolloré scandal, ” refers.

Bolloré Africa Logistics SA (BALSA) would like to set the record straight on the matter of the Open Water Audit Report pertaining to the South African Airways Technical (SAAT) contract, which Mr. Alfred Lees’ statement mentions.

BALSA strongly denies all allegations of corrupt or unethical dealings with SAAT as alleged by the Open Water Audit Report. This is a position that BALSA has held since the first reportage on these audit reports.

BALSA has strongly challenged, and continues to strongly challenge, the legitimacy of the audit reports as presented to the SAAT board. In this regard, BALSA has approached both SAAT and Open Water on numerous occasions to engage on these reports and has not had any success – both SAAT and Open Water have not allowed for any open engagement to get to the bottom of these allegations.

Mentioning the awarding of the respective contract without mentioning what happened beyond the award presents an incomplete and misleading story. BALSA was indeed awarded the contract in 2016. For over one year, BALSA tried to engage with SAAT on the contract and received no favourable response at all. In June 2017, BALSA officially withdrew its interest in the contract because the BALSA board felt there was no intention on the part of SAAT to initiate contract negotiations.

To date, BALSA has not done any work with SAAT regarding this or any other contract. In fact, it is BALSA’s understanding that the contract in question remains with Kintetsu Worldwide Express South Africa (KWE), who have had the contract for numerous years.

BALSA had no contact with SAAT’s senior manager Cassie Le Roux during the bidding process as the audit report and the statement alleges. Le Roux is a former colleague of Arend Du Preez, a former manager at BALSA, with whom du Preez worked at South African Airways. Du Preez left BALSA before the bidding process for the tender in question. Le Roux’s daughter was not employed by BALSA during the bidding process. She was employed by one of BALSA’s structures in 2013 and left early in 2015 before any bidding process at SAAT could begin.

BALSA strongly refutes any allegations of fronting or misrepresenting its shareholder structure. BALSA is a legitimate and operational South African registered, level 2 BBBEE company owned by three shareholders: a French company, Bolloré Transport and Logistics; a South African black woman owned start-up Beryl Logistics, and a trust called Signa Group, whose beneficiaries are black South African women.

BALSA strongly rejects allegations of misrepresenting its capacity in its tender proposal. BALSA’s operations tap into the existing networks and resources of the global business, Bolloré Transport and Logistics. This is a cost-cutting measure that ensure less overheads therefore better pricing, and affords a vast global network of transport and logistics infrastructure. This was clarified in the tender document accordingly. This plug is one of the advantages of running a business with a multinational as a shareholder, the ability to access the multinational’s vast resources and tap into their infrastructure to better serve clients. This was done for this tender proposal, and BALSA continues to do it for other clients.

In conclusion, BALSA maintains that its tender submission and proposal for the SAAT contract in question was above-board, and all proceedings in the tender process were legitimate and ethical. BALSA stands by its tender submission as it presented a best practise warehousing and logistics offering for SAAT, with competitive costing and an unprecedented reach through a global network. While BALSA had welcomed the opportunity to work with SAAT by accepting the letter of award in 2016, BALSA’s active withdrawal in June 2017 was the result of a lack of response and intention from SAAT to initiate and conclude contract negotiations. Since then, BALSA has had no further business or contact with SAAT.

Statement issued by Larry Khumalo, Havas PR on behalf of Bolloré Africa Logistics SA, 11 March 2019