The South African Business Day reports that the Shuttleworth Foundation had lodged an objection with the Competition Commission to the possibility of a merger between South African publishing companies Maskew Miller Longman and Heinemann, resulting from the merger of their international holding companies, Pearson and Harcourt Education International, the foundation said yesterday.

If the Competition Commission found that there was an effective South African merger and that this contravened South African anti-monopoly laws it could force one or both of the international companies to sell off their South African concerns, or dispose of them in a way that did not constitute a merger, said Andrew Rens, the foundation’s intellectual property fellow. The commission has until August 14 to decide whether the international merger means an effective merger between the South African companies.