Cable & Wireless Jamaica plans to fight shareholder lawsuit

Cable & Wireless Jamaica Limited (CWJ), says it intends to vigorously oppose an application made by one of its shareholders seeking permission from the Supreme Court here to file a derivative action in a court in Florida.

Eric Jason Abrahams is seeking permission of the local court to file the action in the United States in name of and on behalf of CWJ against its parent company, as well as some of CWJ’s past and present directors and who he terms shadow directors.

A statement posted on the Jamaica Stock Exchange website, said that Abrahams is taking the legal action for losses sustained by CWJ which he said were caused by them acting in breach of their fiduciary duties, for the sole benefit of the parent company.

Through the lawsuit he is seeking to recover an undisclosed sum of money against assets owned by the parent company in Florida.

According to the statement on the website, it is apparent that his complaints mainly concern the significant losses sustained by CWJ as a result of the lack of regulation for a protracted period of new entrants into the mobile market in the telecoms industry after liberalization.

The parent company had extended financial support to CWJ by way of loans which enabled CWJ to weather that stormy period while CWJ fought to ensure that a level playing field in the mobile market was implemented, which then resulted in a reversal of the previous trend and improvement in CWJ’s revenues, the statement noted.

It ended by stating that “CWJ therefore intends to vigorously oppose the application when it comes on for hearing on the 19th of April 2018”.