IT&E drops its lawsuit against CPUC
Superior Court Associate Judge David A. Wiseman has dismissed the lawsuit filed by IT&E against the Commonwealth Public Utilities Commission for approving the application of Guam-based telecommunications company GTA Services to set up shop in the CNMI.
Wiseman on Tuesday dismissed without prejudice IT&E’s lawsuit after the Micronesian Telecommunications Corp., owner of IT&E, moved for the voluntary dismissal of the case.
Dismissal without prejudice means IT&E can re-file the case in the future.
Attorney Victorino DLG. Torres, counsel for IT&E, and IT&E general counsel Steven Carrara filed in court a notice of voluntary dismissal of the lawsuit.
Torres and Carrara did not explain the reason behind the voluntary dismissal.
In its lawsuit, IT&E asked the court to be allowed to intervene in CPUC’s proceedings concerning GTA’s application for a certificate of public convenience and necessity. It also asked the court to stay CPUC’s Oct. 17, 2011, order that granted GTA its certificate of public convenience and necessity.
Attorney Anthony Long, then CPUC counsel, filed in 2012 a motion to dismiss IT&E’s petition for lack of jurisdiction.
The Attorney General should look into this issue. What happened to the anti-trust suit against MTC regarding ‘long distance’ charging for calls placed inter-island – Saipan, Tinian and Rota. That means telephone calls and fax transmissions charges.
MTC should reimburse all MTC customers for these charges; and while at it make sure that they also look into the submerge land fee…MPLT, DPL AND DLNR take the lead. There’s million of dollars in the fiber optic cable waiting to be harvested.
Lastly, MTC & IT&E – competition is healthy. Let GTA have a piece of the pie…besides, the submerge lands belong to our people.
Peace!