/ 12 August 2004

Telkom sues website owner for R5-million

The owner of the website www.hellkom.co.za on Thursday confirmed he had received a letter from Telkom’s attorneys threatening to sue him for R5-million, if the website isn’t closed by Friday.

Webmaster Gregg Stirton said the high cost and low quality of Telkom’s telecommunication services was hampering South Africa’s economic growth potential.

Last week trade union Solidarity entered into an alliance with Hellkom following Telkom’s announcement of its plans to retrench 4 181 workers over the next three years.

“Hellkom is only promoting the public’s freedom of speech. Telkom’s letter sounds like something from the PW Botha-era,” Solidarity spokesperson Dirk Hermann said.

The Hellkom website will in the future be hosted in Germany due to the high cost of hosting a website in South Africa. ‒ I-Net Bridge