Imagine this: You’re at the grocery store. You notice only one brand of bread available. That’s not fair, right? You should have choices!
That’s where the Competition Commission comes in. They’re like the referees of the business world. They make sure companies play fair and don’t try to cheat or bully others out of the game. Recently, they’ve taken on a giant: Meta, which owns Facebook and WhatsApp. The Commission thinks Meta might be playing dirty, and it’s trying to stop it.
This article will explain how the Commission works and what this fight with Meta means for all businesses in South Africa.
In a world where big conglomerates appear to be too big to fail, and as a result of this, they appear to act beyond the law governing any jurisdiction, companies like Meta Platforms Inc. who own social networking sites such as Facebook and WhatsApp appear as if they are a law unto themselves and are not held to any standards. However, many countries including South Africa have entities set up to regulate such companies thus ensuring that they do not partake in any antitrust or anti-competitive behaviour. Antitrust or anti-competitive behaviours are acts that result in a single company or entity controlling the market in which they transact by either existing as a monopoly over such market or participating in activities that result in price-fixing and the decrease of competitive behaviours between businesses. The main aim of the South African Competition Commission is to regulate the behaviour of companies to stop or prevent practices that may be seen as anti-competitive. The Commission does this by ensuring that companies do not collude in price-fixing nor do they have a monopoly over a market, whereby no other competitor exists or the cost of entry to the market is so high that the perceived benefits do not outweigh them.
The Competition Commission alleges that Meta Platform Inc. is engaging in anti-competitive behaviour by threatening to remove the government’s chat options from their social networking sites (Facebook and WhatsApp), GovChat and #LetsTalk. These chat options were free for the South African public to interact with government officials allowing them to raise their concerns as well as gain access to social grants. These open information streams provided the government with access to thousands of messages daily which provided valuable information enabling the increase of efficiency in service delivery. The removal of such options has resulted in the Competition Commission seeking the Competition Commission Tribunal to impose a maximum fine against Meta South Africa and International. This fine is a total of 10% of the revenue of Meta Platforms Inc.’s South African revenue.
Should you require any assistance or any legal advice in this regard, kindly contact us and we will gladly assist.
Saeedah Salie
saeedah@bbplaw.attorney
Candidate Attorney
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