Details of the multimillion-rand broadcasting deal between the SABC and MultiChoice may never be made public if the two companies get their way in the Constitutional Court, notes a Business Day report. The five-year agreement entered into by the two entities in 2013 resulted in the SABC pocketing more than R500m in exchange for extensive rights to its archived content, with an added pact that MultiChoice would not encrypt SABC TV channels when the country migrates to digital terrestrial television.

If the applicants have their way, not only will the Competition Commission get to investigate whether the deal between the SABC and MultiChoice constitutes a merger, but will also allow the public an opportunity to scrutinise the value of the material the public broadcaster traded with MultiChoice.

Yesterday, the media companies’ legal representatives told the court, during an application for leave to appeal an April decision of the Competition Appeal Court, that the four-year-old matter had dragged on for long enough and the Competition Commission had no power to revive its investigation into the matter as it had missed the opportunity to do so on numerous occasions.

The SOS Coalition and Caxton and CTP Publishers and Printers want the court to determine whether the Competition Commission was entitled to use its investigative powers to determine whether the channel licensing agreement was a notifiable merger in terms of the Competition Act. Judgment has been reserved.

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