KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 6 — DAP chairman Lim Guan Eng again won in his defamation case against Perak PAS chief Razman Zakaria, with the Court of Appeal reportedly upholding a High Court decision which had ruled in favour of Lim.
According to news portal Free Malaysia Today (FMT), the Court of Appeal today dismissed Razman’s appeal and upheld the High Court decision which had ordered Razman to make a public apology and pay RM250,000 in compensation.
The Court of Appeal also awarded costs of RM20,000 to Lim.
Previously on March 14 last year, High Court then-judicial commissioner Datuk Amarjeet Singh Serjit Singh ordered Razman to pay the RM250,000 damages, to make a public apology on his Facebook page over a defamatory statement and to not repea the entire or any part of the defamatory Facebook statement in the future.
In the defamation lawsuit which Lim won, the High Court had also ordered for Razman's public apology's contents to be approved by Lim's lawyers and with any amendment by Lim's lawyers to the apology to be final, and with Razman's Facebook account setting to be set for "public viewing" and for the apology to tag Lim's Facebook account and to remain published on Razman's Facebook account. The High Court also awarded costs of RM15,000 to Lim.
Following the Court of Appeal's decision today, the High Court orders will still stand.
Lim, who is also Bagan MP, had on January 22, 2018 filed the defamation lawsuit against Razman over the latter’s November 18, 2017 Facebook post which was allegedly defamatory against Lim. Lim was the Penang chief minister at the time of the 2017 Facebook post.
Razman was alleged to have claimed that Lim appeared to be supporting a ban on the wearing of headscarves by hotel workers and purportedly defending it as being the right of hotel operators and that Penang allegedly fully supported it.
At the High Court where the defamation case was heard, Lim had reportedly said in his witness statement in court that Razman’s Facebook post was offensive, misleading and untrue, and that he had never made any statement during his tenure as Penang chief minister to support any policy to prohibit Muslim female staff at hotel reception counters from wearing headscarves.
Based on excerpts of a written decision today by Court of Appeal judge Datuk S. Nantha Balan available online in court listings, the Court of Appeal said it only had to decide two issues in the appeal, namely whether publication of Razman's Facebook post was proven and whether the Facebook post was defamatory of Lim.
The Court of Appeal said it saw "no merits" in Razman's argument that publication of the Facebook post was not proven or that no third party was proven to had accessed the Facebook post, saying among other things that it was clear from evidence produced during the High Court hearing that at least 61 persons had posted their comments in relation to Razman's Facebook post.
As for the Facebook posting itself, the Court of Appeal said the High Court was correct to say that it was defamatory of Lim.
The Court of Appeal noted that the High Court judicial commissioner had said the phrase which included "Doa moga ini tidak betul" (Pray that this is not true) in Razman's Facebook post does not take away the "sting" of the Facebook post as any reasonable person reading it as a whole would conclude that Lim purportedly supports the policy of the headscarves prohibition for Muslim female hotel staff at work.
The Court of Appeal said it agrees with the High Court that the words in Razman's Facebook post, namely "doa moga ini tidak betul" (Pray that this is not true) and "kalau ianya benar" (if it is true) "do not act as an antidote" and does not take away the sting which suggests that Lim is someone who purportedly "encourages discriminatory activities and ignores the sensitivities of Malaysian Muslims particularly in Penang".
The Court of Appeal noted that there were 61 Facebook comments to Razman's Facebook post and some had even warned him that he was risking a defamation suit.
The Court of Appeal said it is quite obvious that Razman's Facebook post with its captions being in block letters and with enlarged font size would not need any detailed analysis, as it immediately reveals its defamatory content at first glance.
"Essentially, the Impugned Facebook Posting was one which, even upon a quick scroll or fleeting glance by the reader, defamed the Plaintiff by suggesting, imputing or stating that the Plaintiff was 'anti-tudung', which in the Malaysian context, is highly inflammatory and inherently defamatory of the Plaintiff," the judge said, referring to Lim as the plaintiff.
The Court of Appeal said Razman's "doa" or prayer in his Facebook post that the information regarding Lim's alleged anti-tudung stance would be "untrue" cannot insulate or protect Razman from being found liable for defamation.
Ultimately, the Court of Appeal said it found no error in the High Court's decision, after having considered the matter carefully as well as the extensive written and verbal arguments presented by lawyers for both sides in the case.
"In our view the learned Judicial Commissioner, having considered all the evidence, was fully entitled to reach his evaluative judgement as per the grounds of judgment. Although the Defendant criticised the Judge's approach and reasoning, we are not persuaded that the Judge’s approach was erroneous, the reasoning flawed or the conclusions wrong," Nantha Balan said in the Court of Appeal's decision to dismiss Razman's appeal, referring to Razman as the defendant.
According to national news agency Bernama, Court of Appeal judges Datuk Mohd Nazlan Mohd Ghazali and Datuk Choo Kah Sing also sat on the three-judge panel which unanimously decided to dismiss Razman's appeal.
Lim was represented by the law firm Mureli Navaratnam, while Razman was represented by the law firm, The Law Office of Mohd Harris.
