Christopher Fisher

Employment History: Current Acting Director of Legal Programmes at the Helen Suzman Foundation, former candidate attorney at ENSafrica – competition law department and former philosophy lecturer at the University of the Witwatersrand.

Education: BA (Wits); BA Hons (with distinction) (Wits); MA (Wits) (with distinction); LLB (UCT) and currently awaiting final grading for a completed an LLM (Wits), thesis title: “Transforming Refusals to Deal in South African Competition Law.”

Employment History: Current Lead Researcher at the Helen Suzman Foundation, former candidate attorney at ENSafrica – competition law department and former philosophy lecturer at the University of the Witwatersrand.

Education: BA (Wits); BA Hons (with distinction) (Wits); MA (with distinction) (Wits); LLB (UCT) and currently registered for an LLM (Wits), thesis title: “Transforming Refusals to Deal in South African Competition Law.”

I make this application because it would be a privilege to join the Competition Commission’s market conduct division as it works to transform our economy in line with the Competition Act’s purposes. Merger control, I believe, holds unique potential in this regard because it allows the Commission to prevent market power from harming the economy in the first place – and it allows the Commission to seek opportunities inherent in each merger transaction to further the public interest. Moreover, last year I attended the Commission’s 17th Annual Competition Law and Policy Conference and I was left inspired by the sense of mission and professional excellence with which the Commission’s members filled the auditorium. It would be an incredible opportunity to learn from such a team of professionals. I am confident that I can offer value to the mergers and acquisition division. I have extensive experience, professional and academic, in competition law and in producing quality research. 

I completed my articles at ENSafrica in their competition law department, where I gained significant exposure to merger control in South Africa. I am in the final stages of completing an LLM, with my research focusing on how the Competition Act’s preamble, objects clause and constitutional context informs the prohibition of refusals to supply scarce goods and services. In my current position as Lead Researcher at the Helen Suzman Foundation (HSF), I have gained wide-ranging experience. At HSF, I have researched and written over a dozen submissions to Parliament on proposed legislation and policy changes, managed the drafting and commissioning of court papers and I have coordinated a team of junior researchers towards meeting HSF’s research goals. Last year, in my personal capacity, I co-authored a peer-reviewed work of legal scholarship. All of this work has required me to be meticulous in my research, clear and structured in my written expression, intellectually honest in my analysis of tough questions and has required me to organize my time efficiently to meet tight deadlines. I hope to apply – and develop – these skills at the Commission.

Between 2009 and 2010, I served on the Student Representative Council at the University of the Witwatersrand. Between 2016 and 2017, I served as the Chairperson of UCT’s branch of Students for Law and Social Justice.

• Nicole Fritz, HSF’s former executive director

      082 452 3909

      nicolelfritz@outlook.com

• Prof. Jonathan Klaaren, LLM research report supervisor

      082 411 5787

      Jonathan.Klaaren@wits.ac.za

• Richardt van Rensburg, Principal during my articles and director at ENSafrica,

      076 392 2200

      rvrensburg@ensafrica.com

• Aidan Scallan, Director at ENSafrica

      082 787 9538

      ascallan@ensafrica.com