Tag: Competition Commission

It is vital for employees to understand how to conduct themselves during dawn raids or interactions with regulators. Failure to do so may result in significant consequences for the employer. The European Commission recently fined a European company after a senior employee deleted private WhatsApp messages during a dawn raid pertaining to a competition law violation.

Collaboration between government and business is vital to realising economic growth. Government should set up a conducive environment for businesses to operate while businesses ensure that they help grow the economy and employ citizens. This partnership must ensure that socio-economic goals are also met for the benefit of citizens.

The fluctuations of the South African currency (the rand) in the period leading up to the recent national and provincial elections, and during the negotiations by political parties to form a Government of National Unity (GNU), have resulted in many wild and drunken speculations - especially on social media.

The South African Competition Commission has published its final revised Public Interest Guidelines relating to merger control. The guidelines serve to clarify the commission’s stance on public interest factors as set out in the Competition Act 89 of 1998 (as amended).

The Electronic Communications Amendment Bill, 2022, which introduces a number of significant amendments to the Electronic Communications Act 36 of 2005 (the ECA), has been published. Interested parties have until 23 July to submit written comments regarding the bill.

On Wednesday, 24 May 2023, the Minister of Trade, Industry and Competition (MTIC) published the Energy Users Block Exemption and Energy Supplier Block Exemption. The Energy Users Block Exemption allows for collaboration between energy users to respond to the current electricity supply constraints subject to a process of notification to the Competition Commission and the Department of Trade, Industry and Competition (DTIC).

The Competition Commission has aroused the ire of mainstream economists and analysts with its latest Essential Food Pricing Monitoring Report for 2021 to 2022. It has charged the maize as well as the meat and poultry markets with ‘excessive pricing’.  This time, even the halls of academia through the likes of Prof. Johan Kirsten of Stellenbosch University, shook in disagreement.

The international company Meta (which owns Facebook and WhatsApp) has been referred to the Competition Tribunal, to be fined 10% of its turnover for violating Section 8 provisions of the Competition Act, which prohibit the abuse of dominance by a company.

The Competition Commission has recently referred WesBank, the car finance division of First Rand Bank, and Toyota Financial Services South Africa (TSA) to the Competition Tribunal, to be fined 10% of their turnover for the alleged violation of the Competition Act.

The Competition Commission has recently prohibited a transaction between Emerging Capital Partners Africa (ECP) and Grand Parade Investments, a private equity firm listed in the Johannesburg Stock Exchange. The transaction would have seen ECP acquire Grand Parade’s stake in Burger King South Africa (BKSA) as well as Grand Foods Meat Plant (Pty) Ltd.