VKG asks justice minister to check independence of Competition Authority
The Northeast Estonia-based oil shale industry company Viru Keemia Grupp (VKG) has asked Minister of Justice Urmas Reinsalu (IRL) to conduct an inquiry into the deficient performance and independence of the Competition Authority.
In a letter to the minister, CEO of VKG, Ahti Asmann, said that the company’s multiple exchanges with the competition watchdog had led it to the conclusion that the agency was neither efficient nor independent in exercising its supervision of competition in the Estonian economy.
Asmann pointed out that the Competition Authority over the last 10 years had not issued any significant fines for harming competition that only benefited offenders. He acknowledged the agency’s preferred course to use resources for improving behavior rather than fining, but said that substantially more resources were needed for this course to be efficient.
“Competition supervision in its current form has led to questionable or downright competition-harming results in a number of cases,” Asmann said, mentioning as an example cash transport, where the market-leading company had been given permission to raise the price of its service while acquiring its sole competitor. This deprived the interests of those companies of protection
that depended on the cash transport service.
The head of VKG also accused the competition watchdog of giving preferential treatment to the state-owned energy group Eesti Energia and its subsidiaries. He recalled a contentious case from the past concerning VKG’s request to the Competition Authority to check the price of oil shale Eesti Energia sold to VKG for compliance with the competition law. According to Asmann, the agency used a methodology for its study it had never used before, one which was not regarded suitable in the practice of competition law, and which resulted in acceptance of a criminal price charged by the market-dominating supply company.
“This raises the question why the Competition Authority deviated from its own and the Supreme Court’s previous practice in a proceeding involving a state-owned company, as a result of which no violation was established,” Asmann said.
Editor: Editor: Dario Cavegn
Source: BNS