OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Wednesday 3.00pm.
CONSORTIUM bidding for the country’s third cellular licence, NextCom, has won its high court application, with costs, to stop the awarding of the licence on Friday.
The Pretoria High Court ruled on Wednesday that the South African Telecommunications Regulatory Authority must inform NextCom of its decision. Nextcom will then have five days to challenge the decision before the licence is awarded.
Nextcom is also reportedly considering a damages suit against Satra which may amount to millions.
The awarding of a lucrative third cellular licence was dealt a further blow after reports on the weekend named a number of government mininsters as being involved in irregularies in the tender process.
Controversial former deputy environment minister Peter Mokaba has been named as the mastermind in an alleged plot to compromise the integrity of SA’s third cellular licence.
City Press reported that it had access to a sworn affidavit claiming Mokaba approached one of the bidders for the licence and offered to use his influence with Satra councillors to ensure the bidder in question would be granted the licence.
In exchange, the affidavit says, Mokaba wanted a shareholding of 9% — worth about R500-million — in the consortium. City Press reports that, if the allegations can be proved, the award of the third cellular licence — already mired in controversy — could be fatally compromised and the government forced to go back to the drawing board.
Cell C director Zwelakhe Mankazana has denied that Cell C was the bidder allegedly in cahoots with Mokaba. Business Day reports Mankazana as saying: “We have not been collaborating with any minister or official, because we don’t need them.”