An Interview with Ibrachy & Dermarkar discussing Cartels in Egypt
Dr Amir Ibrahim has international experience in competition and commercial legal matters. He is among the few Egyptian experts in the area of competition and economic regulation handling complex merger and acquisition cases as well as related economic matters. He has solid experience in advising businesses in the pharmaceutical, digital and tech industries.
He has litigated landmark cases in the area of sport broadcast rights and restrictive licensing practices. He has also successfully litigated several arbitration disputes related to other broadcasting rights.
He was appointed by presidential decree as board member to the Supreme Council of Media. During his public tenures, he contributed to the draft of competition law and public procurement law. He is a former chair of the Egyptian Competition Authority, and a former board member of the Gas Regulatory Authority, the Ministerial Committee for the Protection of Intellectual Property Rights, and the Anti-Dumping and Trade Remedies Board.
Amir holds a PhD degree in competition law from Queen Mary University of London, and an LLM in international and European business law from Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne.
1 What kinds of infringement has the antitrust authority been focusing on recently? Have any industry sectors been under particular scrutiny?
The Egyptian Competition Authority (ECA) is the authority competent for monitoring economic markets in Egypt. It also enforces and implements the provisions of Law No. 3 of 2005 on Competition Protection and Prevention of Monopolistic Practices (the Egyptian Competition Law).
The ECA’s main focus recently has been bid rigging in public procurement and the promotion of competitive neutrality. In 2021, the ECA and the General Authority of Government Services of the Egyptian Ministry of Finance jointly issued a circular regarding the guidelines for fighting such conduct and, since then, the ECA has been implementing an integrated strategy for raising awareness of bid rigging in public procurement and the importance of competitive neutrality.
It is worth mentioning that the ECA was recently able to detect several infringements and bid-rigging practices in the market for electric poles and iron pipes. Bidders were exchanging confidential and sensitive information, and accordingly coordinating their practices regarding progressing or refraining from entering bidding processes administered by electricity distribution companies. The ECA also detected infringements by three companies in the chemical industries sector who coordinated their bids in relation to tenders organised by the Egyptian Petroleum Research Institute. Recently, the ECA reported a finding of cartel infringements among egg farmers and, separately, some book publishers.
As publicly reported by the ECA, throughout 2022, it reportedly assessed and examined a total of 344 cases under different competition policy areas across various sectors and markets. However, the healthcare and pharmaceutical sector had the largest share, holding 82 per cent of the total number of examined cases. This was followed by 4 per cent held by the real estate sector and 3 per cent held by the food industry. The remaining cases were divided between the automotive and transportation sector; supply of electricity and gas; and electronics, telecommunications and media, among others. However, information regarding how many cases out of the number declared are cartel investigations and, more importantly, how many cases were concluded on a finding of infringement was not reported.
It is relevant to note that the ECA has been stripped of its powers to investigate cartels in the banking sector after the entry into force of Law No. 194 of 2020 on the Central Bank and Banking System in early 2021. As a result, the assessment of horizontal agreements in the banking sector is now under the auspices of a special competition unit within the Central Bank of Egypt. Nevertheless, since its establishment, no cases or investigation have yet been reported.