Ten years of enforcement by the South African competition authorities – Unleashing rivalry
This review of the first ten years of the activities of the Competition Commission and Competition Tribunal sets out how we have tackled the main areas of our work. Obviously, the authorities are not best placed to critically assess their own performance. This will doubtless be done by others. Rather, this review aims to describe the main patterns and developments, to note the key decisions and discuss their implications.
It is primarily a story about cases. Cases are our daily staple – through case investigations and hearings we learn about competition law and economics, and through decisions the jurisprudence develops. Inevitably in a review such as this, there is some selectivity about what to highlight or what is given greater weight. We have sought to provide a balance between different areas, while at the same time bringing out in more detail issues such as the Commission’s corporate leniency policy, which has played a very important role in cartel enforcement in recent years.
In addition, we have incorporated short reflections from some of the many participants in our history – trade unionists, business people, journalists, practitioners and past and present office bearers of the institutions. All these have added their personal perspectives to the telling of our story.
