Goodyear South Africa (Pty) Ltd v Competition Commission and Others

Goodyear South Africa (Pty) Ltd is one of several tyre manufacturers accused by the Competition Commission of participating in a cartel between 1999 and 2007 to fix tyre prices, in contravention of section 4(1)(b)(i) of the Competition Act 89 of 1998. The matter, initiated following a complaint in 2006, has been subject to prolonged litigation and interlocutory disputes. At a pre-hearing conference in December 2021 before the Competition Tribunal, Goodyear sought to introduce an economist’s expert report to support its defence that its price increases were unilateral and driven by raw material costs. The presiding Tribunal member, sitting alone, issued a written directive refusing to admit the expert report as an expert witness statement. Goodyear appealed this directive to the Competition Appeal Court.

The appeal was upheld. Paragraph 6 of the directive issued on 15 December 2021, excluding Goodyear’s expert report, was set aside. Each party was ordered to pay its own costs.

The case clarifies the limits of a single member’s powers in Competition Tribunal pre-hearings, confirming that only interlocutory decisions may be taken by a single member under section 31(5) of the Competition Act. It also reinforces a modern, interests-of-justice approach to appealability in competition proceedings, focusing on the effect of a decision rather than its form. The judgment is important for safeguarding fair hearing rights in complex and long-running competition cases.