TCL to challenge CARICOM Commission

The Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) Wednesday granted permission to the Trinidad Cement Limited (TCL) to challenge the jurisdiction of the CARICOM Competition Commission to investigate the cement market.

The commission has been conducting an enquiry into the alleged anti-competitive business conduct by TCL in relation to the sale and distribution of its cement products within the CARICOM region.

TCL sought an order in the Original Jurisdiction of the CCJ for permission to commence proceedings under Article 222 of the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas, which states that private entities may bring a matter before the CCJ, once special leave has been granted.

After hearing submissions from attorneys for TCL and the Competition Commission, the Port-of-Spain-based CCJ agreed to hear the case and ordered that TCL file its documents to begin hearings within seven days.

TCL, which also has operations in Barbados, Jamaica, Anguilla, Guyana and Haiti, contends that in December 2009, the Council of Trade and Economic Development (COTED) "apparently made a request" to the commission to investigate "the operation of the market for the production and sale of cement in CARICOM".

"TCL has never received a copy of the COTED request and only found out about it upon receipt of the Notice of Enquiry from the commission dated 24th August, 2011 which was served on TCL on 2nd September, 2011," the company said in documents filed with the CCJ.

"The COTED request, by its very terms, was outside the boundaries of the permissible request which COTED was authorised to make under Article 175(2) of the Revised Treaty, which was restricted to matters relating to prejudice to trade and distortion of competition," it added.

TCL further claimed that as a party interested in the COTED request, it was never consulted by the commission or "provided with a copy of that request or given the opportunity to make representations to the commission so that the commission could have made a preliminary assessment as to whether that request merited further consideration and investigation."

It said it would appear from the "Notice of enquiry that an investigating panel of the commission was convened and an investigation in connection with the COTED request was undertaken."

- CMC