Nexus gets three weeks` notice

Johannesburg, 28 Oct 2004

While progress is slowly being made on finding a shareholder to take up the remaining 26% stake in the second national operator (SNO), problems have arisen on another front.

This week, a judge ordered communications minister Ivy Matsepe-Casaburri to provide Nexus Connexion, the SNO`s 19% empowerment shareholder, and its lawyers with three weeks` notice, should she decide to go ahead with implementing the SNO licence.

This follows a court application from Nexus, seeking a judicial review of the process that saw a 25% combined shareholding in the SNO awarded to two foreign bidders, namely CommuniTel and Two Consortium.

At the same time, Bowman Gilfillan Attorneys, the lawyers for Nexus, filed an urgent interdict to prevent the minister from implementing her decision to license the SNO.

"We have now postponed our application on the strength of the minister`s undertaking to give three weeks` notice, and will obviously look at resubmitting it, should she change her mind about the licence," says Daniel Pretorius of Bowman Gilfillan.

"At this point there are ongoing discussions among the existing shareholders and I think we all hope that an agreement will be reached that will be good for everyone, but at this point it is too early to tell."

He says that in the meantime, the application for the judicial review is still grinding along slowly, and attorneys are waiting for the minister to submit an answering affidavit, after which they will have to reply on behalf of Nexus, before a date for a hearing can be set.

This means a hearing is unlikely to come before the courts before February or March next year.

"Obviously it would be ideal if the shareholders can resolve their differences without us having to resubmit our application, but for now we will just have to wait and see what happens," says Pretorius.

SNO interim chairman and spokesman, Karl Socikwa of Transtel, was unavailable for comment, although an official response is expected soon.