NATIONAL NEWS - The Constitutional Court (ConCourt) has ruled in favour of Vodacom, sending the legal battle with Please Call Me inventor Nkosana Makate back to the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA).
The judgment, delivered on Thursday, relates to Vodacom’s application for leave to appeal against a February 2024 SCA ruling.
The appeal, heard by the ConCourt last November, challenged the SCA’s decision to overturn Vodacom’s offer of R47 million in compensation to Makate, who developed the Please Call Me service that allows network users to send free callback messages.
In its ruling, the SCA ordered Vodacom to pay Makate between 5% and 7.5% of the total revenue the service generated since its launch in 2001, plus interest.
While the minority judgment of the SCA estimated the compensation to be around R186 million, the majority opinion placed Makate’s potential payout between R29 billion and R63 billion.
Despite this, Makate’s legal representative told the ConCourt that his client is willing to settle for R9.4 billion.
ConCourt judgment in Vodacom vs Makate case
On Thursday, outgoing Acting Deputy Chief Justice Mbuyiseli Madlanga delivered his final judgment from the bench, describing the nearly two-decade legal saga as “an unending litigation”.
Madlanga highlighted that a 2016 ConCourt ruling had previously led Vodacom CEO Shameel Joosub to calculate R47 million following unsuccessful negotiations between the telecommunication company and Makate.
The judge noted Vodacom’s argument that the SCA went beyond its jurisdiction by replacing the Gauteng High Court in Pretoria’s initial order, in determining the amounts.
Madlanga overturned the SCA’s ruling and instructed that the case be sent back to the appeal court to be reconsidered by a new panel of judges.
“The Supreme Court of Appeal failed to provide adequate reasons for its judgment and disregarded or was unaware of certain material acts and issues before it,” he ruled.
Article: Caxton publication, The Citizen
‘We bring you the latest Garden Route, Hessequa, Karoo news’
