LAHORE – Competition Commission Pakistan (CCP) has fined Rs 23 million on Pakistan Jute Mills Association (PJMA) and its 10 member mills charging cartelised behaviour and malpractices. This was disclosed by the CCP Chairperson Rahat Kuanain Hassan, while addressing the members of the Lahore Economic Journalists Association here on Thursday.
CCP chairperson said that the commission’s policy of targeting business malpractices through dialogue had begun to yield positive results as several businesses had shown willingness to curtail anti-competitive practices. “We, as a competition agency, do not want to scare businesses but to discipline them,” she stressed. Ms Hassan termed the latest CCP move against collusive market behaviour of jute mills as a landmark in the history of the commission.
She revealed that it was the first instance when some businessmen admitted their fault, so the commission took a lenient view while imposing a penalty of Rs 23 million of which the PJMA was slapped with a penalty of Rs 5 million and big players Rs 2 million each while two small jute mills were imposed a fine of Rs 1 million each. She said that that the PJMA had admitted to its contravention and pledged to reform itself in line with competition laws.
The CCP ackonwledged their cooperation in this regard and their willingness to reform, she added. Responding to a question, she said cartelisation was a criminal offence everywhere in the world and the commission was compelled to act. Referring to the jute mills case, she pointed out that the commission had imposed a token penalty on jute millers when compared with penalties imposed on other cartels exposed by the CCP.
Speaking about deceptive marketing, Ms Hassan said though the instances of deceptive and misleading marketing campaigns could be dealt with criminal proceedings under the competition laws, but on most of the occasions the Commission did not imposed any fine as the party confronted agreed to remove the irritants identified by CCP with regards to deceptive marketing.
Regarding the fate of many high profile cases in which businesses have been highly penalised, CCP chairperson said that the punished parties had exercised their right to appeal, which was a common practice worldwide. She said the commission always tried to pursue all cases diligently, but the litigants were using every facility available in the law to prolong cases in court, a process which could drag out over several years.
However, the final decisions of these cases would impact on competition and fair trade practices in the country. “Whether the CCP orders are upheld or rejected, a judicial precedent will be set for the future,” she added.
