Phone book firm in 2nd costly defeat

A SECOND attempt to get the High Court to shut up and in effect close down a former business partner-turned-competitor of the company holding the contract to compile and publish Namibia’s national telephone directory, African Directory Services, this week ended in a second costly defeat for ADS.

Three weeks ago, ADS asked the High Court in an urgent application to issue an interdict against Lance Cotterell, a minority shareholder and former consultant with the company. ADS asked the court for an order to stop Cotterell from “unlawfully competing” with ADS “by spreading malicious falsehoods” about the company, from “unlawfully interfering” with contractual relationships between ADS and its clients, and from “competing unlawfully” with ADS “by misappropriating and misusing confidential information” belonging to the company.Not satisfied that ADS’s case was as urgent as it was made out to be, Judge Louis Muller threw the matter out of court, ordering ADS to also pay the legal costs of Cotterell and his company, Wildlife Conservation Company.Three weeks later, on Wednesday this week, ADS was back in court with a second, slightly trimmed down but essentially similar urgent application against Cotterell and Wildlife Conservation Company, of which a division, Directory Advisory Services, has been the vehicle of the activities of Cotterell that have driven ADS to court twice in less than a month.Again, ADS’s application was dismissed, with costs.Like Judge Muller before him, Judge Sylvester Mainga was this week also not convinced that ADS’s case met the requirements for the High Court to hear a case on an urgent basis.In the second application, ADS was asking the High Court for a restraining order against Cotterell and his company in terms of which they would have been barred from competing unlawfully with ADS “by misusing confidential information” belonging to ADS, as well as from unlawfully interfering with the contractual relationships between ADS and its various clients.The lapse of time between the dates when ADS and its board chairman, Tshoombe Ndadi, say they became aware of the double-dealing role that they claim Cotterell played in ADS, as well as his subsequent contacts with ADS clients that ADS claims is undermining its business, and the date on which the company approached the court, appear to have put paid to its claims of urgency.According to Ndadi, he discovered in October last year that Cotterell had been feeding a competitor in Botswana with inside information on ADS’s bid on a tender to get the contract to also compile and publish Botswana’s national phone directory.Cotterell has admitted that he leaked the information to the competitor, AC Braby, but defended this as an act that was aimed at exposing “unethical and dishonest conduct” on ADS’s part in the first place.ADS had received inside information from a contact in the Botswana Telecommunications Corporation that enabled it to submit a bid that won the tendering contest against AC Braby, Cotterell claims.In the two applications in the High Court, Ndadi has been complaining that since he was kicked out of ADS in October, Cotterell has been approaching valuable clients of ADS in an attempt to convince them to decrease their advertising in the phone directory, of which the marketing, compiling and publication is a multi-million dollar business each year.Cotterell’s take on this complaint has been that he has merely been offering legitimate advice to the advertisers on how they could spend their advertising dollars more wisely while still optimising the exposure that they would be getting in the phone book.Ndadi has charged that Cotterell has been using information belonging to ADS, but which he unlawfully took with him when he was booted out of the company, in his quest to damage ADS’s business by trying to convince key clients that they had been overcharged by ADS for their advertising entries in the phone directory.ADS has held a seven-year contract from Telecom Namibia to market, compile and publish the phone directory since 2000.As part of the contract, the company had to guarantee set minimum income limits for Telecom Namibia each year.These started at N$6 million for the 2000/01 directory, and have been increasing gradually over the years to the minimum revenue level of N$12,2 million for the 2006/07 directory.In total, ADS’s contract with Telecom guaranteed the parastatal income of N$67,7 million over the contract’s seven-year period.ADS would be entitled to 30 per cent of this revenue, according to the contract with Telecom Namibia.Herman Oosthuizen, instructed by Chris Brandt, has been representing Cotterell in both cases in the High Court.South African senior counsel Etienne Labuschagne, instructed by Elise Angula of the firm LorentzAngula Inc., has been representing ADS.ADS asked the court for an order to stop Cotterell from “unlawfully competing” with ADS “by spreading malicious falsehoods” about the company, from “unlawfully interfering” with contractual relationships between ADS and its clients, and from “competing unlawfully” with ADS “by misappropriating and misusing confidential information” belonging to the company.Not satisfied that ADS’s case was as urgent as it was made out to be, Judge Louis Muller threw the matter out of court, ordering ADS to also pay the legal costs of Cotterell and his company, Wildlife Conservation Company.Three weeks later, on Wednesday this week, ADS was back in court with a second, slightly trimmed down but essentially similar urgent application against Cotterell and Wildlife Conservation Company, of which a division, Directory Advisory Services, has been the vehicle of the activities of Cotterell that have driven ADS to court twice in less than a month.Again, ADS’s application was dismissed, with costs.Like Judge Muller before him, Judge Sylvester Mainga was this week also not convinced that ADS’s case met the requirements for the High Court to hear a case on an urgent basis.In the second application, ADS was asking the High Court for a restraining order against Cotterell and his company in terms of which they would have been barred from competing unlawfully with ADS “by misusing confidential information” belonging to ADS, as well as from unlawfully interfering with the contractual relationships between ADS and its various clients.The lapse of time between the dates when ADS and its board chairman, Tshoombe Ndadi, say they became aware of the double-dealing role that they claim Cotterell played in ADS, as well as his subsequent contacts with ADS clients that ADS claims is undermining its business, and the date on which the company approached the court, appear to have put paid to its claims of urgency.According to Ndadi, he discovered in October last year that Cotterell had been feeding a competitor in Botswana with inside information on ADS’s bid on a tender to get the contract to also compile and publish Botswana’s national phone directory.Cotterell has admitted that he leaked the information to the competitor, AC Braby, but defended this as an act that was aimed at exposing “unethical and dishonest conduct” on ADS’s part in the first place.ADS had received inside information from a contact in the Botswana Telecommunications Corporation that enabled it to submit a bid that won the tendering contest against AC Braby, Cotterell claims.In the two applications in the High Court, Ndadi has been complaining that since he was kicked out of ADS in October, Cotterell has been approaching valuable clients of ADS in an attempt to convince them to decrease their advertising in the phone directory, of which the marketing, compiling and publication is a multi-million dollar business each year.Cotterell’s take on this complaint has been that he has merely been offering legitimate advice to the advertisers on how they could spend their advertising dollars more wisely while still optimising the exposure that they would be getting in the phone book.Ndadi has charged that Cotterell has been using information belonging to ADS, but which he unlawfully took with him when he was booted out of the company, in his quest to damage ADS’s business by trying to convince key clients that they had been overcharged by ADS for their advertising entries in the phone directory.ADS has held a seven-year contract from Telecom Namibia to market, compile and publish the phone directory since 2000.As part of the contract, the company had to guarantee set minimum income limits for Telecom Namibia each year.These started at N$6 million for the 2000/01 directory, and have been increasing gradually over the years to the minimum revenue level of N$12,2 million for the 2006/07 directory.In total, ADS’s contract with Telecom guaranteed the parastatal income of N$67,7 million over the contract’s seven-year period.ADS would be entitled to 30 per cent of this revenue, according to the contract with Telecom Namibia.Herman Oosthuizen, instructed by Chris Brandt, has been representing Cotterell in both cases in the High Court.South African senior counsel Etienne Labuschagne, instructed by Elise Angula of the firm LorentzAngula Inc., has been representing ADS.