Tribunal grants Commission’s strike out application in relation to
allegations of political interference in proposed coal mining merger

 
Allegations of political interference against the Competition Commission (the Commission) made by the South African Energy Forum (the SAEF), in relation to a proposed coal mining merger, will be struck from the SAEF’s intervention application that was heard by the Competition Tribunal (the Tribunal) on Friday, 16 October 2020.
 
This follows a strike out application brought by the Commission in which it argued before the Tribunal that the SAEF’s allegations of political interference were false, unsubstantiated, scandalous and vexatious - and that the allegations were prejudicial to the Commission and its officials.
 
Intervention and strike out application
 
The SAEF describes itself as an informal organisation which, according to it, is a gathering of activists that advocates for, inter alia, equitable involvement in energy and mining technologies.
 
The SAEF applied to the Tribunal to be an intervenor in the merger proceedings involving Thabong Coal (Pty) Ltd and South32 SA Coal Holdings (Pty) Ltd. In its intervention application, the SAEF referred to a newspaper article to insinuate political interference at the Commission during the latter’s investigation of the proposed merger.
 
Despite the SAEF having confirmed its availability on 29 September 2020 for the hearing on 16 October 2020, the SAEF informed the Tribunal on 12 October 2020 (and restated on 14 October 2020) that it was no longer available on 16 October 2020 as it had “confirmation for a meeting” on that day. The SAEF, not having brought a formal postponement application, was not present during the virtual proceedings to orally respond to the Commission’s strike out application. It did, however, file an answering affidavit. The Tribunal, after consideration of the papers filed by both the Commission and the SAEF as well as the Commission’s oral submissions, subsequently granted the Commission’s strike out application.
 
The Commission further, in relation to its strike out application, argued that a punitive cost order should be imposed on the SAEF on the basis of what it described as egregious allegations and xenophobic comments made by the SAEF towards Commission officials. The Tribunal reserved judgement on costs.
 
The Tribunal’s reasons for granting the strike out application will be given in due course.
 
As mentioned, the SAEF was absent during the virtual proceedings relating to its intervention application (parts of which were the subject of the Commission’s strike out application).
 
The merger parties argued for the dismissal of the SAEF’s intervention application, inter alia, for the reasons that the SAEF did not make out a case for intervention and did not indicate how it could be of any assistance to the Tribunal in its decision making regarding the proposed merger.

The merger parties further argued that the SAEF’s intervention application does not provide any detail regarding the constituency it represents. The Tribunal will issue its decision regarding the intervention application in due course.