Aviation doctor demands SAA and CAA withdraw 'false' statements against her

Dr Nonhlanhla Sishaba, an aviation medical examiner, has categorically denied allegations levelled against her by the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) and her employer, SAA, saying they were simply not true. 

She has also demanded that both the CAA and the SAA withdraw their media releases and publicly apologise to her.

On September 10, the CAA issued a statement announcing that it was finalising an investigation into alleged improper and fraudulent conduct by Sishaba, “a former senior designated aviation medical examiner (DAME)”.

The CAA said Sishaba's designation as DAME expired on March 31 and had not been renewed pending the ongoing investigations into her conduct. It said its online system flagged that Sishaba continued to examine and issue medical certificates in gross violation of civil aviation regulations.

The following day, SAA issued a statement announcing it had suspended Sishaba as its chief medical officer. 

In a statement on Friday, Sishaba said the CAA had published untested allegations in the national media regarding her registration as a DAME.

She said it was incredible how the CAA, an organ of state, could act so irresponsibly by publishing details about a process that, according to it, it was still investigating and one in which she had not made full representations. 

“The innuendo in the media releases is that I, through fraud, compromised public safety. This is simply not true and the alarmism is intended only to justify CAA and SAA’s unlawful conduct,” Sishaba said. 

She said her employer did not allow her an opportunity to respond to the yet to be completed investigation and yet it found it fit to not only suspend her but to publish in the national media that she had been suspended for misconduct. 

Even if the allegations had some merit, she said, neither CAA nor SAA had fully engaged her lawfully for her to be heard, as was her constitutional right. 

Sishaba said both the CAA and the SAA had violated her constitutional rights and caused great damage to a reputation she had painfully built over 22 years in the medical profession. 

The haste and recklessness with which the CAA and SAA had published the matter in an incomplete investigation could not have been in good faith. she said.

“The truth will be revealed in due course but I ask all of my clients to exercise patience while I fight against this wanton damage of my good name.”

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