South African Airways (SAA) says it has turned the corner, but the Auditor-General says the books cannot be trusted.

SAA’s latest audit outcome for 2024/25 from the Auditor-General was a disclaimer, one of the most severe findings possible. It means auditors could not obtain sufficient reliable information to verify the airline’s financial position. It was the second year in a row that the airline received such an audit outcome.

While SAA claimed to have made a profit two years in a row, the Auditor-General said that the airline’s financial statements were not a “true reflection” of its financial position.

This was revealed in Parliament this week.

The findings point to deep and persistent weaknesses. The Auditor-General flagged inferior financial reporting, revenue leakages, and control failures that have now stretched over several years.

The Auditor-General also flagged issues such as billing delays exceeding 90 days, missing supporting documents, weak inventory controls, and payments made without proof of delivery, which all suggest that key financial disciplines are not being enforced. In any private firm, such lapses would trigger immediate intervention.

The airline’s revenue was also boosted after it sold its landing slot at Heathrow airport in London, one of the busiest airports in the world (reports in June 2025 indicate that SAA sold that slot for R1 billion, which would have contributed to its profitability).

Transport Minister Barbara Creecy, under whose responsibility SAA falls, also criticised the airline, saying that the two consecutive disclaimer audit findings were “unacceptable”.

She said, “While there were some improvements in passenger numbers and in passenger revenue, I think that we’re still a long way from being a profitable entity, which is where we would want to be.”

Another sign of instability was the unexpected resignation earlier this month of SAA’s group CEO, Professor John Lamola, and three SAA board members.

Lamola will be replaced by Matshela Seshibe as the acting CEO. Seshibe is currently CEO of SAA’s catering arm, Air Chefs, but was previously CEO of Daybreak Farms, a state-owned chicken farmer. He was suspended from that position for alleged irregular payments but was subsequently cleared of any allegations, according to reports. Nevertheless, it is important to note the business still collapsed under his watch. In 2025 the National Council of Societies for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (NSPCA) also laid criminal charges against the directors of Daybreak Farms because of the neglect of chickens under their care, with the birds going unfed and cannibalising each other. More than a million chickens were neglected by Daybreak, according to the NSPCA.

SAA faces other serious issues, too, with authorities investigating theft at SAA Technical, another SAA subsidiary. Expensive avionics have allegedly been stolen by staff at SAA Technical and sold abroad. Expensive parts would be ordered with claims that they were needed urgently and then would sit in storage and go missing.

SAA may be flying again, but its financial foundations remain unstable. Until the controls are fixed, any claim of a turnaround rests on numbers that cannot yet be trusted.