Netia goes to Poland's top authority in hopes of blocking Warsaw license
In its lawsuit filed last Thursday, Netia is arguing that the current license holder, Elektrim subsidiary El-Net, should not have been granted the plum local fixed-line license for Warsaw because its bid was riddled with more than 30 technical faults. El-Net won the tender for the license last December when its $300 million offer was declared the highest bid.
Netia, Poland's largest independent telephone company, has already failed once in its bid to reverse the Communications Ministry decision. Last month Communications Minister Maciej Srebro upheld his December 1998 decision granting the local fixed-line telephony license to El-Net, rejecting Netia's arguments to overturn the case.
Netia is now taking those same arguments to the NSA. It will ask a three-judge panel to nullify El-Net's license on the basis that the winning bid contained 30 alleged faults, the company said. Netia is focusing on two key issues: that El-Net was allowed to present several different bids in the process while other contenders were forced to stay with one; and that El-Net's tender documentation included the price of its bid before it was supposed to be presented. That second point alone should have bumped El-Net from the bidding, Netia said.
At stake is the most lucrative local calling market in Poland, as Warsaw and its suburbs generate about 40% of all fixed-line revenue in the country, analysts have said.
In his decision on Oct. 11, Srebro agreed with Netia that El-Net's tender documents contained errors, but he judged the errors not significant enough to justify nullifying El-Net's license.
The NSA is the highest court of appeals for cases involving administrative decisions. A three-judge panel will hold hearings and possibly ask for additional information before making its decision, a process that could take from weeks to months, a lawyer familiar with the case said.
If the NSA, however, upholds the Communications Ministry decision granting El-Net the local license for Warsaw, Netia still has one path of attack left. If it can persuade either the Justice Ministry, the general prosecutor or the president of the supreme court that its arguments have still not gotten a fair hearing, one of those bodies can choose to take the case to the nation's Supreme Court, said the lawyer, who did not wish to be named. In a parallel process, Netia is also asking the NSA to block the implementation of the Communication Ministry's license, which means effectively freezing El-Net's operations on the construction of its telecom network in Warsaw.
Netia has won 23 other licenses for local telecommunications services, including the licenses for six of the country's 10 largest urban areas: Krakow, Poznan, Gdansk, Lublin, Katowice and Opole. In all, the company's licenses give it access to 13 million customers. As of June 1999, Netia had almost 200,000 subscriber lines.
Netia, Poland's largest independent telephone company, has already failed once in its bid to reverse the Communications Ministry decision. Last month Communications Minister Maciej Srebro upheld his December 1998 decision granting the local fixed-line telephony license to El-Net, rejecting Netia's arguments to overturn the case.
Netia is now taking those same arguments to the NSA. It will ask a three-judge panel to nullify El-Net's license on the basis that the winning bid contained 30 alleged faults, the company said. Netia is focusing on two key issues: that El-Net was allowed to present several different bids in the process while other contenders were forced to stay with one; and that El-Net's tender documentation included the price of its bid before it was supposed to be presented. That second point alone should have bumped El-Net from the bidding, Netia said.
At stake is the most lucrative local calling market in Poland, as Warsaw and its suburbs generate about 40% of all fixed-line revenue in the country, analysts have said.
In his decision on Oct. 11, Srebro agreed with Netia that El-Net's tender documents contained errors, but he judged the errors not significant enough to justify nullifying El-Net's license.
The NSA is the highest court of appeals for cases involving administrative decisions. A three-judge panel will hold hearings and possibly ask for additional information before making its decision, a process that could take from weeks to months, a lawyer familiar with the case said.
If the NSA, however, upholds the Communications Ministry decision granting El-Net the local license for Warsaw, Netia still has one path of attack left. If it can persuade either the Justice Ministry, the general prosecutor or the president of the supreme court that its arguments have still not gotten a fair hearing, one of those bodies can choose to take the case to the nation's Supreme Court, said the lawyer, who did not wish to be named. In a parallel process, Netia is also asking the NSA to block the implementation of the Communication Ministry's license, which means effectively freezing El-Net's operations on the construction of its telecom network in Warsaw.
Netia has won 23 other licenses for local telecommunications services, including the licenses for six of the country's 10 largest urban areas: Krakow, Poznan, Gdansk, Lublin, Katowice and Opole. In all, the company's licenses give it access to 13 million customers. As of June 1999, Netia had almost 200,000 subscriber lines.
