Maroc Telecom Fined $238 Million for Anti-Competitive Behavior

Morocco’s National Telecommunications Regulatory Agency (ANRT) has slapped a fine of MAD 2.45 billion ($238 million) on Maroc Telecom Group (IAM) for failing to comply with the agency's fair competition rules.

Laayoune – Morocco’s National Telecommunications Regulatory Agency (ANRT) has slapped a fine of MAD 2.45 billion ($238 million) on Maroc Telecom Group (IAM) for failing to comply with the agency’s fair competition rules.

ANRT said the fine is the culmination of an accumulative fine that it imposed on IAM back in January 2020 for violating fair competition.

“Maroc Telecom has abused its dominant position in the market and blocked competitors’ access to unbundling on its network and the fixed market for the last seven years,” ANRT said in its January 2020 ruling.

Back then, the agency encouraged Maroc Telecom, to take action to resolve this issue, notably by implementing measures that promote fair competition.

IAM was mainly accused of monopolizing Morocco’s telecommunication infrastructure and preventing other telecom companies from exploiting the network optimally.

ANRT set a daily fine of MAD 4.1 million ($400,000) for every day that IAM failed to comply with the agency’s fair competition instructions.

Maroc Telecom Group has 30 days to appeal the $238 million cumulative fine in court.

IAM’s group has subsidiaries in a number of African countries, including Burkina Faso, Cote d’Ivoire, Benin, Gabon, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, the Central African Republic, and Togo. These different branches bring in most of the group’s profits and transactions.

According to IAM’s June 2022 financial report, the company’s revenues in Morocco, which totaled MAD 9.5 billion ($930 million), showed an increase of 2.2% compared to the first half of 2021, when the revenues registered a decline of 7.1%.

Nearly 75 million clients made up IAM’s customer base as of June 30, 2022, a 1.9% growth compared to the previous year. Meanwhile, this growth was mostly due to a 2.8% increase in the number of clients in IAM’s African subsidiaries.

Earlier this year, however, the company saw its customer base register a decline of 1.31%. Maroc Telecom and its subsidiaries across Africa were home to an estimated number of 76 million customers as of April 2022.