The Competition Commission will this month start hearing evidence as to whether SA's mobile operators fixed interconnect fees among themselves.
The hearings, and the investigation, are expected to be dealt with in the first half of the year, possibly bringing to an end an almost six-year-long probe into the mobile industry.
However, the matter could be referred to the Competition Tribunal if the investigation merits a penalty.
ITWeb has documentation that shows the first complaint of collusion on pricing was brought to the Competition Commission against MTN, Vodacom and Cell C in 2004. Two others were submitted in 2005, one relating specifically to interconnect.
Keith Weeks, head of the commission's enforcements and exemptions division, says two of the operators are due to give testimony under oath this month. He cannot name the operators that will appear before the commission, as this may jeopardise its investigation, he says.
The commission's investigation comes in the midst of a heated interconnect debate, with operators and the Independent Communications Authority of SA (ICASA) failing to agree to the interconnect rate cuts promised by communications minister Siphiwe Nyanda last year.
ICASA says the glide path presented to it by the operators did not represent the promised final blended rate of 77c announced by the minister to Cabinet last year. It will not allow the operators to implement new rates without its involvement.
Called to task
Weeks says the commission's investigation into interconnect fees is separate to the regulatory issue currently under way. He explains that the commission is investigating charges of price fixing and that operators agreed the termination rates among themselves.
Weeks says the commission is engaging with the operators and they have been co-operating in providing evidence. He explains that, if it is found that the alleged collusion took place under the regulatory environment and was not anti-competitive, this will close the matter.
When the initial interconnect fee was agreed upon by Vodacom and MTN, it was a bilateral agreement and may have resulted in an anticompetitive environment, but - in itself - the agreement was not collusive, as ICASA allowed it. “We need to establish that it all was above board,” explains Weeks.
The commission is now trying to determine whether the setting of rates, prior to Cell C's entry into the market in November 2001, was anti-competitive. He adds that the probe may include Telkom because of fixed-mobile interconnect. “We need some finality on that [issue],” says Weeks.
Not guilty
Vodacom has said it will cooperate fully with the Competition Commission's investigation, and has previously denied any collusion in fixing the termination rate.
Nadia Bulbulia, Cell C's executive head of regulatory affairs, says the company is not aware of any hearings and has not been approached by the Competition Commission. The operator has previously denied any involvement in price fixing.
MTN was not able to comment this morning. However, it previously denied it had engaged in collusive conduct relating to interconnection.
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