Vodacom Please Call Me fight continues

Nkosana Makate, the person who claims to have invented Vodacom’s Please Call Me service in 2000, has filed papers in the Constitutional Court in his ongoing battle with the operator. This is according to the Business Times.

Makate is fighting Vodacom in a bid to get additional compensation – as much as R6.75 billion – which he says he was promised by the company.

According to Makate, his former boss Philip Geissler promised – in an oral agreement – to facilitate remuneration negotiations with the company.

Vodacom in turn argued that the rights to anything developed or produced by its employees belong to the company. Makate disputed this, saying the idea fell outside of his normal duties at Vodacom.

Vodacom also highlighted that the manager who promised Makate additional compensation for the service did not have the right to do so.

Last year the South Gauteng High Court dismissed a case brought against Vodacom by Makate.

Makate then applied for leave to appeal against the judgement.

In March, the Supreme Court of Appeal rejected Makate’s application, finding he had “no reasonable prospects of success”.

He is not giving up, though.

Business Times reported his Constitutional Court case argues that the court is denying him his “constitutional right to access the courts, and the right to own property by refusing to hear the appeal”.

The full Business Times article is available in the Sunday Times of 19 April 2015, or online on the BDLive website. 

More on the Vodacom Please Call Me case

Vodacom Please Call Me: Knott-Craig tells full story

Vodacom Please Call Me case: the inside story

Vodacom “Please Call Me” case: legal backing revealed

Vodacom Please Call Me court battle