An Accra Commercial Court has issued a bench warrant for the arrest of the Directors of Millicom Company Limited, operators of Tigo, for failing to appear before it on a contempt of court application, brought against them by one of its distributors in the country.

The Managing Director and the Co-African Head of Millicom International, Percy Grundy, a 36-year old Bolivian and a 37-year old Paraguayan are affected by the arrest warrant, in addition to two other Directors of the company.

The order, issued by Justice Henry Kwofie, last Thursday, resulted from a writ filed against the Telecommunication Company by Superphone Company Limited, a Tigo distributor, operating for over 7 years, for wrongful termination of contract.

However, court officials and police personnel, who went to the offices of Millicom Company Limited to effect the arrest of the Directors of the company could not succeed as they were told that none of the persons were available.

Officials of the company were taken aback as they witness their offices being invaded by Police personnel as well as the press.

Superphone Company Limited had its contract terminated by Millicom Company Limited on January 15, 2008, for territorial invasion introduced by the company in November, last year, without providing any prove of the breach.

On July 10, 2008, Superphone Company Limited, the plaintiff company consequently filed for an interlocutory injunction restraining the Millicom Company Limited, the respondent company and its agents from going ahead to terminate the contract.

The injunction was, however, granted on July 23, 2008, by the court, presided over by Justice Marful-Sau, an Appeal Court judge with additional responsibility as a High court judge, who further granted the parties the opportunity to engage in arbitration procedure. This was after Counsel for the Respondent Company told the court that the contract entered into by the parties made provision for arbitration procedures, failure of which a legal action could be taken.

However, the respondent company failed to appear in court for the quasi-criminal action taken against it and filed an application before the court, opposing the order of injunction granted by the court.

The court, therefore, issued a warrant for the arrest of the company’s Directors and further dismissed its application, opposing the injunction granted against Millicom Company Limited, as without merit and awarded a cost of GH¢ 800 against the telecommunication company.



Source: The Chronicle