Please Call Me inventor Nkosana Makate says he is expected to pay to his lawyers 20 percent of the money he is going to get from Vodacom and that the Constitutional Court’s cost order against him is “extraordinary,” “rubbish” and “nonsense”, and will have a “chilling” effect on anyone fighting corporate giants like Vodacom.
Makate said the order of the apex court states that he must pay Vodacom’s legal costs, including those of its three legal counsels, further ballooning his legal bill.
Makate was speaking to Sunday World this week in reaction to the Constitutional Court judgment on Thursday that the case between him and Vodacom be sent back to the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) to be heard afresh by a new panel of judges.
The highest court in the land set aside the SCA’s February 2024 judgment that ordered Vodacom to pay Makate an amount of between 5% and 7.5% of the total revenue made through the Please Call Me service for more than 18 years.
This would have amounted to a settlement of between R9-billion to R63-billion.
Makate said he did not understand why he had to be punished for the SCA “botching the case”.
Regarding the legal costs order against him, Makate said “it was extraordinary for the Constitutional Court to reach a decision like that”.
“The Constitutional Court decision blamed the SCA judges for botching the case.
“Why are they making the litigant pay [the legal costs]? The Constitutional Court said the SCA judges did not listen to the case properly. So, where do I feature? The decision of the Constitutional Court is nonsense and rubbish,” said Makate.
“This case is about greed and bullying… The R47-million Vodacom is offering me is an insult. It is a travesty of justice…,” said Makate.
When asked how much he has spent on paying his lawyers, Makate said: “I am using my lawyers on a contingency basis. They are not invoicing me now. They will be invoicing me at the end [of the case]. I do not know how much I will be paying them. What I will be paying them will depend on the quantum that I will eventually get. I do not have an estimate of how much I will be paying them, but it will be 20% of what I will get.”
The unanimous judgment was penned and delivered by now-retired Constitutional Court judge and former Acting Deputy Chief Justice Mbuyiseni Madlanga during a special court session in Braamfontein, Johannesburg.
Madlanga said the court had upheld Vodacom’s appeal of the SCA February 2024 decision to set aside Vodacom’s R47-million offer to Makate and remitted the case back to the SCA for a fresh hearing by a new panel of judges. The new SCA hearing would determine whether or not Vodacom’s R47-million offer to Makate was fair and equitable.
“Each party must pay their own wasted costs in respect of the abortive hearing of the matter in the Supreme Court of Appeal. The first respondent [Makate] must pay the applicant’s costs in this court, including the costs of three counsel,” continued Madlanga.
He added that the ConCourt judgment “merely highlights the fatal shortcomings in the SCA judgment and does not make its own decision on any of the attendant issues. Those are the very issues that ought to have been decided by the SCA…
“In this judgment, we dealt with factual issues, without deciding them, purely to demonstrate the SCA’s failure to comply with the duty of proper consideration. We cannot suddenly be at large, as the legal language says, to determine those
factual issues…”
Makate said he remains determined despite the ConCourt setback. “I am resilient. We will go back to the SCA. We will do what we have to do; I do not expect any free lunches.”
Makate has told the court that he deserved compensation of R9.4-billion, while Vodacom argued that he could not be entitled to up to R63-billion, so it offered him R47-million, now R80-million with interest.
Previously, Vodacom CEO Shameel Joosub had offered Makate the R47-million for his Please Call Me idea.
Makate gave his Please Call Me idea to Vodacom on November 21, 2000, and it was implemented in March 2001, but the legal standoff only began in 2008.
The Please Call Me service, which has earned Vodacom billions of rands, allows network users to send free messages asking for a call back.
Makate, 48, detailed that he came up with the idea at 24 because of the need to communicate with his then girlfriend, now wife, after he had bought her a cellphone. The couple married in 2004, and have three daughters.
Makate now works at the South African Local Government Association as head of business development. He has held the position for more than 10 years.
