Chairperson, Competition Commission of Pakistan (CCP) Rahat Kaunain Hassan on Thursday categorically said that no clients or companies were ever recommended by the Commission to her former law firm, but highly professional and senior lawyers have been hired by the Commission for pleading CCP cases at judicial fora.
Responding to queries on her appointment challenged in the courts, she told reporters that all allegations made in the courts regarding her appointment are 'pack of lies'. Till to date no notice in this regard has been received from either by the court or the purported petitioner. The baseless allegations appear to be the work of people taken to task internally and perhaps some vested interest outside the Commission. CCP and myself both are on the right side and we are not deterred by the smear campaign.
On the issue of petitions filed against her in courts, Rahat Kaunain Hassan was of the view that such petitions contain false allegations to malign her image. These allegations have been made just to stop her from taking action against few persons involved in corruption within the commission.
She also shared the names of top lawyers hired by the CCP for pleading their cases in different courts. It is an unbelievable lie that I have given any case to my former firm. In the presence of the top lawyers hired by the commission, there is no need to give any case to my former firm.
Rahat Kaunain was of the view that the elements involved in corrupt practices within the CCP could be involved in launching campaign against the commission. The few persons have been involved in corruption and breach of confidence and the CCP is holding an inquiry against few officials within the commission. These few persons have been involved in launching a campaign against the CCP to bar them from internal inquiry. However, we will ensure transparent inquiry against these few persons despite their organised campaign against the CCP. These persons are trying to harass the CCP Chairperson by making false allegations, but the CCP would complete its investigation at any cost and continue its enforcement actions against the
She stated that 'I am clean and I have nothing to fear' she said that she is also aware that 'following the straight path is always difficult but such aspersions and malicious acts cannot deter her from pursuing matters and taking actions that she has initiated and is determined to follow'.
As for her name 'Kaunain' being used in the law firm's title; she said that there is no bar and there is ample healthy precedent in this regard. In fact, it is a world-wide recognised practice and many instances exist even in Pakistan. She added that no clients or companies were ever recommended by her to her former law firm. In fact, as a matter of record in over a hundred cases pending before courts, not even in a single case her former firm represented any client having conflict of interest with the CCP. She added that she has never met the Governor of Punjab and is not aware of any lobbying being done for her appointment.
Any or all appointments of the counsels were made with the approval of the former Chairman who was the competent authority in this regard and no payments were or are routed through the Legal Department.
She said the CCP has determined certain focal areas such as restricting collusive bidding in public procurement contracts, investigating concession agreements expanding the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) to curb deceptive marketing practices, working on how to restrict associations to their mandate and improving the legal framework on which the Commission is based to more effectively implement this new roadmap.
She said that the Pakistan, because of its large public sector, spends an estimated 25 to 30 percent of its GDP on public procurement. With such an enormous public procurement volume, the importance of restricting an anti-competitive and corrupt practice such as collusive bidding is paramount.
Similarly, investigating concession agreements is another area. Concession agreements are typically used in areas such as electricity, water, sanitation, telecommunications, roads, railroads, ports airports, oil and gas. They are typically granted for a specified, lengthy, period to the firm that offers to provide the service on the best terms while meeting certain criteria, generally involving quality and investment. Since a concession agreement vests a state-sanctioned dominant position, the stages of the granting and implementation of a concession agreement have clear competition law implications in Pakistan, and ensuring that concessions are designed, granted and implemented in compliance with the Competition Act (2010) should, therefore, be a focus of the CCP in the coming year.
"We have found that in most of the cartels, the associations have played a very important role as facilitator of collusive behaviour. With over hundreds of associations we need to work and create awareness as to how these associations can be restricted to their lawful mandate", she said.
The CCP decisions by the office of fair trade (OFT) in prohibiting deceptive marketing practices has been really well received but right now, because of capacity as well as resource constraints, we have not been able to establish it as an independent department. We want it to grow as a full-fledged department. The vision that we have and what we want others to understand is that you 'say what you mean and sell what you show'. I think the consumers will benefit a great deal once we actively start interacting with them on this aspect. We also want to improve the legal framework in particular, with focus on mergers and acquisitions. We want to bring our regulations in line with the best practices that are there in developed regimes.