Cape Town - Although the airline industry worldwide is struggling with high costs we can expect a drop in the price of domestic fares from the end of next month if low-cost airline Fastjet enters the market, as expected.
Its attempt to buy 1Time out of provisional liquidation and use its licence to start operating in this country has failed. But it announced this week that it now had a South African partner to meet the requirement of 75 percent South African ownership and would start a new service between Cape Town and Johannesburg soon after the end of May.
Its new partner, described as a South African investment company, Blockbuster, about which very little seems to be known except that it has a connection with Edward Zuma, a son of President Zuma, has made a commercial arrangement with a small South African airline, Federal Airlines, for Fastjet to use its licence.
Domestic fares rose by an estimated five percent after 1Time stopped flying in December, reducing the number of flights at the busiest time of the year.
Fastjet is the holding company of Fly 540, a low-cost airline started in Kenya five years ago by business conglomerate Lonrho.
Fastjet grew rapidly and now operates in Tanzania, Ghana and Angola, as well as Kenya. It aims to become a pan African airline and include its South African operation in the network.
Its chief executive, Ed Winter, said it aimed at keeping fares affordable, not just at the launch but in the long term.
It plans to start the South African operation with two flights a day between Cape Town and Durban, seven days a week, in the morning and evening at popular times for the business market, which is likely to hurt SAA and its low-cost division, Mango, and British Airways franchise holder Comair and its low-cost airline, kulula.com.
Service returns
Meanwhile Comair is due to return to the route between Johannesburg and Maputo from which it withdrew last year because it was unprofitable. It has been taking bookings since December.
Its earlier flights were from Lanseria Airport but the new service will be from OR Tambo Airport, from where it will provide a connecting service to Maputo for passengers arriving from overseas or leaving Mozambique for other countries in Africa or overseas.
Points to ponder
My mention last week that SAA has formed a partnership between its Voyager loyalty programme and that of the Legend hotel group, which enables members of either to exchange their points on a one-for-one basis either towards free or cheap flights or hotel rooms or luxury goods, has brought a complaint from a reader that the flights are “far from free” because the points don’t cover airport charges, fuel levies and other extras.
These can add up to thousands of rands.
It’s unfortunate that airline passengers are targeted by many governments – particularly that of the UK – because of a mistaken perception that air travel is a luxury. - Weekend Argus