MTN's shenanigans against Vodacom's Knott Craig - but most fascinating is the press says nothing, because guess who pays for their advertising and their 'editorial independence'

TECHCENTRAL: Knott-Craig presented his evidence to the press. He felt they had a duty to report the behind-the-scenes behaviour that had compromised the authenticity of their MTN versus Vodacom story.

He received apologies and it was clear that the affair had caused the press a great deal of embarrassment, but no major exposé of the affair was forthcoming. There was only one extensive story published by The Star on 28 July 1998, accompanied by an amusing black-spy versus white-spy cartoon. A senior director at KPMG also called Alan to apologise and to tell him that the company had withdrawn its “clean” audit. Alan had a further opportunity to reveal what had happened when Joan Joffe, Vodacom’s marketing manager at the time, told him that she was due to be interviewed on Radio 702 along with her MTN counterpart, Jacques Sellschop. The helicopter saga had left relations between the two network giants delicately poised, and Joan wanted Alan’s advice on how she should approach the interview.

“Give them hell,” he told her. And she did. Joan was not a street fighter, but she was not about to retreat into a corner. The interview was vicious.

SHOOT: Fascinating parable this, and shows to what extent money corrupts the press and companies based entirely on trust, auditors. Quite simply, when it comes to money, virtually no one is trustworthy.

clipped from www.techcentral.co.za Alan said to the press tongue-in-cheek, “Competition is great. What we fear most is that we will beat MTN out of business and then we won’t have any competition.” On one occasion, however, this good-spirited rivalry turned into something rather unpleasant. In July 1998, MTN’s Bob Chaphe challenged Alan to pit the quality of Vodacom’s network coverage against that of his own. “We’ll organise the whole event,” Bob said. ‘The idea is to gather an entourage of technical experts and journalists, including consumer guru, Isobel Jones, to drive through Johannesburg to see which network performs the best. Of course, it will be audited by KPMG to ensure the veracity of the results.” “No way,” said Alan. “I’m not playing it by your rules. I would rather not be part of a one-sided game. You go and play by yourself. We’ll sit this one out.” “Scared of the competition, Alan?” Bob laughed. “Not even a little, boet,” Alan assured him.