The federal agency says the stay will remain in effect until its request for a stay and injunction can be heard.
The injunction would prevent the two companies’ proposed deal, at a cost of $26 billion, from proceeding until a full appeal of Thursday’s decision by the Competition Tribunal is heard.
In its decision, the Competition Tribunal determined that the merger of Shaw and Rogers would not likely result in higher prices for Canadian customers.
He also said he was convinced that the sale of Freedom Mobile, owned by Shaw, to Videotron was sufficient to ensure that competition was not substantially lessened.
Disagreeing with this interpretation, the Competition Bureau appealed the decision, arguing that the Tribunal acted outside of its jurisdiction.
If the Tribunal’s decision is upheld following the appeal process, all that will be missing is approval from federal Industry Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne to go ahead with the merger.
Mr. Champagne said on Saturday that he will not give his decision until the ongoing legal battle has been clarified.
