The Competition Commission has released proposed amendments to its guidelines on small merger notification, which are set to take effect after 7 June 2021.

Quite apart from its well publicised lapses of governance, South African Airways (SAA) has been a serial visitor to the Competition Court since 1998 over accusations that it violated fair competition rules. Recently, the national airline was ordered to pay R104m to Nationwide for infringements of competition rules. This case serves as a useful barometer for meauring damages in similar cases, says Ahmore Burger-Smidt.

As of this month, price fixing, market allocation and collusion could carry prison sentences of up to 10 years. Company managers and directors are now playing in a different league. The kind of collusive tendering we saw in the World Cup and Gauteng Freeway Project will in future likely result in criminal charges against the company bosses involved.

Competition never sat easy with SAA, which used R30 billion in taxpayer-funded bailouts over the last decade to shut down a string of competitors, from Sun Air to Trek and tiny Flitestar. No competitor was too small to overlook. Now its demons have come to haunt it in the form of two court challenges that could cost the airline over R6 billion in damages.

Comair recently lost its case in the Pretoria High Court challenging SAA's latest government bail-out. The national carrier has received no less than R30 billion in government money over the last two decades, and has sunk no fewer than 10 start-up airlines in the process. SAA is a national disgrace, argues Leon Louw.

The state attorney's efforts to hide from the public the endless bail-outs that have bankrupted 10 airlines - all in the service of keeping SAA alive - show pure contempt for the public, argues Leon Louw of the Free Market Foundation.

The Competition authorities have trained their eyes on 82 car manufacturers who are accused of collusive tendering. This follows a similar investigation into removal companies, according to Business Day.

The Competition Commission recently launched dawn raids on two firms suspected of collusive conduct. This proactive trend is likely to continue, according to an areticle by legal firm Norton Rose.