South Africa: Changes to COMESA Competition Regime

In brief

COMESA has recently adopted the COMESA Competition and Consumer Protection Regulations (2025) and COMESA Competition and Consumer Protection Rules (2025), which are effective as of 5 December 2025. This marks the most significant overhaul of the regional regime in two decades, and repeals the previous COMESA Competition Regulations (2004) and COMESA Competition Rules (2004). The most significant change is that the COMESA merger regime is now mandatory and suspensory. This means that all notifiable mergers must receive prior approval from the COMESA Competition and Consumer Commission before implementation.