KUALA LUMPUR: A newspaper publisher and its editor had bad intentions when they reported that a PAS lawmaker had misbehaved and created a nuisance during a debate in Parliament 14 years ago by challenging a government backbencher to a fist fight, said the Court of Appeal.

Judge Datuk Hishamudin Mohd Yunus said this was a deliberate act of “pick and choose”, and “blacking out” of facts that were favourable to the plaintiff, Datuk Mahfuz Omar from PAS.

Hishamudin said the court had also rejected the defence of justification and qualified privilege advanced by the defendants — The New Straits Times (M) Bhd (NST) and Berita Harian’s former group editor Datuk Ahmad Rejal Arbee.

“On the facts, we find that clearly there was malice on the part of the defendants as shown by the manner the incident was reported,” the judge said in the written grounds of the judgment which last year upheld a defamation suit brought by Mahfuz.

The 25-page written grounds dated March 17 are now available on the Malaysian judiciary website.

The defendants said what was published about Mahfuz in the report by the Berita Harian daily was a true account of what had transpired in Parliament, that Mahfuz challenged Tampin Member of Parliament (MP) Shahziman Abu Bakar to a fist fight outside Parliament.  

Hishamudin said Shahziman gave evidence but denied having behaved in a provocative manner.

“In his evidence he alleged that it was the plaintiff who made the challenge to a fight. Thus there was conflicting evidence,” the judge said.

Hishamudin said based on the evidence and the established facts, there was no justification to interfere with the findings of the trial judge.

In the judgment, he said the defendants had failed to mention in their newspaper report the provocative conduct of Shahziman.

“The Hansard clearly showed that the plaintiff was not the party that had acted in a provocative manner. He was merely responding to the challenge of a fight by Shahziman,” he said.

He said Mahfuz had said twice that he had come to Parliament not to fight with anyone but to participate in the debate.

The judge said the allegation of aggressive behaviour against the plaintiff was a serious one, considering that he is an MP.

“[Neither] the reporter nor the first defendant, as an editor, took steps to verify the facts by waiting for the Hansard report,” he added.

The defendants, the judge said, had made no effort to seek comments from the plaintiff on the incident, particularly, to obtain his version of what actually transpired.

The Court of Appeal also maintained the RM150,000 damages awarded by the High Court to Mahfuz in 2009.

Mahfuz was further awarded RM40,000 in legal costs.

He filed the civil suit against NST and Ahmad Rejal in 2002 over a front-page article on Nov 9, 2000 titled “Mahfuz ajak wakil BN bertumbuk” (Mahfuz invites BN rep to a fist fight).

In his statement of claim, Mahfuz, who is Pokok Sena MP, said the article was defamatory in nature and had tarnished his reputation. — The Malaysian Insider

This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, on April 9, 2015.