Budget carrier FlySafair, South Africa’s largest airline, cancelled about 12% of its flights on Monday as it prepares for a pilots’ strike.

Operations continue largely as scheduled, Kirby Gordon, the airline’s chief marketing officer said in a interview on SAfm radio Monday.

Labour union Solidarity said that the company threatened to lock out pilots from Tuesday because the employees voted to strike. 

The lockout threatens to disrupt the carrier’s operations for two weeks, the union said in a statement on Sunday.

“Solidarity gave FlySafair notice of a one-day strike, but FlySafair hit back with a notice that it would lock out the pilots for seven days, which could last for another seven days,” it said.

“This forced Solidarity to extend its strike notice to 14 days as well.”

An unspecified number of FlySafair flights have been cancelled on Monday, though operations continue “largely as scheduled,” the carrier said in a separate statement.

FlySafair accounts for about 60% of domestic seat capacity in South Africa and carries an average of 30,000 passengers per day.

The Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA) has offered its help in terms of section 150 of the Labour Relations Act to resolve the dispute between Solidarity and FlySafair.

Solidarity has formally agreed to the CCMA process, but by the end of the weekend, FlySafair had not agreed to it.

This comes after 90% of FlySafair’s pilots voted in favour of a strike. Solidarity gave notice that the pilots would only be on strike for one day.

However, FlySafair responded by locking out the pilots for seven days. After this, the lockout could continue for yet another week.

This led Solidarity to also extend its strike notice to two weeks in line with FlySafair’s lockout notice.

“We welcome the CCMA’s intervention. The disruption of an airline is a matter of national interest. Such disruption must be avoided. Our aim with the one-day strike notice was to get FlySafair to the negotiating table,” Solidarity said.

“We were prepared to do everything possible over the weekend to prevent the disruption and find a solution with the help of the CCMA. Instead of coming to the table, FlySafair escalated the disruption by locking out the pilots for at least seven days.”