THE GOVERNMENT has filed an appeal against the Constitutional Court's ruling on December 20 last year that the exclusive licence granted to Cable and Wireless Jamaica under the Telecommunications Act 2000 was unconstitutional.
InfoChannel Ltd., an Internet service provider, had brought a motion contending that its constitutional rights were breached when the exclusive licence was granted.
The court had ruled that the government should compensate InfoChannel and Stanley Beckford, an InfoChannel customer who claimed also that his constitutional rights were breached when Philip Paulwell, Minister of Commerce, Science and Technology and the Office of the Utilities Regulation (OUR) refused to grant InfoChannel a licence to provide the telecommunications services, including Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP).
InfoChannel is claiming more than US$100 million in damages from the government. The Constitutional Court ruled that damages should be assessed in favour of InfoChannel and Beckford.
The Minister of Commerce, Science and Technology and the Attorney-General have filed several grounds of appeal contending that the Constitutional Court erred when it ruled that VOIP was a data service and the Minister was unlawfully providing that service prior to the passage of the Telecommunications Act.
The appellants will be asking the Court of Appeal to find that the court erred when it ruled that Beckford had a constitutional right to access VOIP. They are also appealing on the ground that the court erred in holding that the relevant provisions of the Telecommunications Act were unconstitutional.
