Taib vs Malaysiakini: Decision on March 17
Long-serving Sarawak Chief Minister Abdul Taib Mahmud’s defamation suit against Malaysiakini will be decided in less than three weeks.
UPDATED 1.20PM
Malaysiakini's application to strike out the defamation suit will be decided in three weeks.
Long-serving Sarawak Chief Minister Abdul Taib Mahmud’s defamation suit against Malaysiakini will be decided in less than three weeks.
After hearing submissions from counsel for both sides, High Court judge John Louis O'Hara ruled he would decide on March 17 on Malaysiakini’s application to strike out the suit.
In Malaysiakini's final submission, counsel K Shanmuga (left) said Taib lacked a cause of action against the online news portal.
The claim is also an abuse of the court process, the lawyer said.
"This is because there is no law made by Parliament enabling a restriction on the defendant's fundamental liberty to freedom of expression by the creation of a tort of libel to enable a government official, like the plaintiff, to sue a journalist and a news organisation, like the defendants, for libel," he told the Civil Division of the High Court in Kuala Lumpur this morning.
"The right to free speech and expression is not confined to speech which is merely favourable or inoffensive, but extends to those which offend," he said.
However, Taib's counsel, Yee Mei Ken, argued that whether there was a restricted or liberal interpretation of the Defamation Act, it did not change the fact that the law of libel still existed in Malaysia.
"It is apparent... the right of a person to bring (a) libel claim against a defamer is enshrined in common law and is fully recognised in Malaysia, without question," he said.
Defamation suit in 2007
Taib had sued Malaysiakini in 2007 for defamation when the portal ran a series of reports quoting Japanese newspapers.
These highlighted investigations by the Japanese tax authorities against members of a shipping cartel that transported logs from Sarawak.
The cartel members had allegedly paid RM32 million in kickbacks to Regent Star, a Hong Kong-based paper manufacturing company reportedly linked to Taib and his family.
The issue was picked up by numerous news organisations in Japan and elsewhere.
Malaysiakini had followed up with its own report a week later, and subsequently produced its own special issue on the matter, 'RM32 mil kickbacks - tip of the iceberg'.
In the meantime, Taib is still appealing to the Federal Court to overturn the Court of Appeal’s decision to throw out its application to remove three crucial parts from Malaysiakini’s defence.
This leave application will be heard on May 9.
