Moroccan Court Orders Maroc Telecom to Pay $620 Million for Anti-Competitive Practices

Inwi claimed 6.85 billion dirhams in compensation for "anti-competitive practices" by the group led by Abdeslam Ahizoune. But the Commercial Court slightly revised this amount, ordering Maroc Telecom to pay 6.3 million dirhams to its competitor. This decision comes a few months after Maroc Telecom was sanctioned by the National Telecommunications Regulatory Agency (ANRT) for abuse of dominant position and ordered to pay a fine of 2.45 billion dirhams, recalls Jeune Afrique.

In this case against Inwi, Maroc Telecom had already been sanctioned in 2020 by the ANRT to pay more than 300 million euros to its competitor. "It was then blamed on the number one Moroccan telecoms for not applying unbundling, a practice that provides for the sharing of certain internet and fixed-line connection infrastructures with the competition to balance the market," specifies the magazine, stressing that Inwi had then expressed its satisfaction with this sanction which, it hoped, "would help restore healthy competition in the telecommunications market."

But Maroc Telecom would not have complied with these sanctions, which would have prompted Inwi to file a new complaint against the group on December 16, 2021 regarding unbundling. "For the third quarter of 2023, Maroc Telecom recorded a 3.2% increase in its earnings before interest and taxes (Ebitda) (i.e. 14.5 million dirhams), driven mainly by its sub-Saharan subsidiaries," indicates Jeune Afrique, revealing a 10% drop in the group’s share price on the Casablanca Stock Exchange.