South African Airways (SAA) have initiated processes to sell nine of its Airbus aircraft, according to a tender document, which seeks proposals from interested buyers.

Reuters reported on Thursday that the Airline, which was placed in a form of bankruptcy protection late last year, is selling the Airbus A340-300s and A340-600s as well as 15 spare engines.

This development is happening even as government is scrambling to secure extra funding in a last attempt to rescue the national carrier and around 10,000 related jobs.

Tito Mboweni, the country’s finance minister, informed business leaders in Johannesburg ahead of the World Economic Forum annual meeting in Davos next week that the Treasury had provided “financial support to the best of our abilities”.

“As of yesterday, when I was speaking to the director-general of National Treasury, we were still trying to find additional financing for SAA. … Let’s keep our fingers crossed,” he said.

SAA was promised two billion rand (US$ 139 million, Sh13.9bn) from the government and another two billion rand from lenders. But while the lenders paid up, the Treasury has yet to establish a mechanism for identifying and dispersing its share

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