Court of Appeal president Rohana Yusuf, who chaired the apex court panel, dismissed MyCC’s leave application to appeal against a lower court’s ruling, after hearing arguments from lawyers for both parties.
“This is our unanimous decision. This is not an appropriate case for us to answer all the questions of law posed by the applicant (MyCC),” she said. Other judges who sat with her were Abdul Rahman Sebli and Mary Lim.
The court also ordered MyCC to pay a total of RM60,000 in costs to MAS and AirAsia.
Last year, both firms succeeded in quashing the fines imposed by MyCC against them for allegedly breaching a market-sharing prohibition.
In its decision, the Court of Appeal had said the collaboration agreement between MAS and AirAsia was entered on Aug 9, 2011, several months before the Competition Act came into force.
In 2014, MyCC found that both airlines had breached the market-sharing prohibition under Section 4(2)(b) of the Competition Act by entering into an agreement on sharing markets in the air transport services sector within Malaysia.
The quantum of fine by MyCC was based on flights by both AirAsia and MAS in the four months between Jan 1 and April 30, 2012 on the Kuala Lumpur-Kota Kinabalu, Kuala Lumpur-Kuching, Kuala Lumpur-Sandakan and Kuala Lumpur-Sibu routes.
MAS and AirAsia were represented by Logan Sabapathy and Ambiga Sreenevasan, respectively, while Gopal Sri Ram and Lim Chee Wee appeared for MyCC.
In another matter, the court dismissed MyEG Services Bhd’s attempt to obtain leave to challenge MyCC’s RM9.33 million fine against the company for abusing its dominant position.
MyEG was penalised after it had imposed different conditions in the purchase of mandatory insurance for renewing temporary work visit pass for foreign workers.
Rohana said the questions of law posed by MyEG to challenge the RM9.33 million fine have failed to satisfy the threshold under Section 96 of the Court of Judicature Act for the highest court to hear the case.
The panel ordered MyEG to pay RM30,000 in costs to MyCC.
Lim again appeared for MyCC while lawyers Zulkelfi Ahmad Makinudin and Hafarizam Harun represented MyEG.