PUTRAJAYA: Utusan Melayu (M) Bhd and TV3’s applications for leave to appeal against the decisions of the Court of Appeal in respect of the civil suits filed against them by former Perak Menteri Besar Datuk Seri Mohammad Nizar Jamaluddin will be heard together by the Federal Court.
A Federal Court five-member panel led by Justice Tan Sri Suriyadi Halim today granted Utusan Melayu’s request to either have the two leave to appeal applications consolidated or heard together.
Earlier, lawyer Datuk Firoz Hussein Ahmad Jamaluddin who represented Utusan Melayu submitted to the panel that it was to ensure uniformity in the decisions in the two suits since it involved similar allegations and the same plaintiff.
He added that counsel representing TV3 had also relayed to him that the television station was not objecting to Utusan Melayu’s application.
Counsel Mohammad Zamri Ibrahim who represented Mohammad Nizar, countered that he had no objections for the two applications to be heard together but disagreed that they should be consolidated.
On Dec 6, last year, the Court of Appeal upheld a High Court decision to allow Mohammad Nizar’s libel suit against Utusan Melayu and awarded him RM250,000 in damages.
On Feb 25, this year, another Court of Appeal coram allowed Nizar’s appeal to set aside the decision of another High Court, which had dismissed his RM50 million defamation suit against TV3 and the producer of Buletin Utama, Rohani Ngah.
That Court of Appeal coram chaired by Justice Datuk Mohamad Ariff Md Yusof had held that there was malice in the report by the television station which did not prove that its report was true or partially true.
The Court of Appeal subsequently remitted the case back to the High Court for assessment of damages.
Nizar filed the civil suits against Utusan Melayu and TV3 alleging that they had defamed him over his tweets on the WWW1 vehicle registration number which was successfully bid for by the Sultan of Johor in May 2012. — Bernama