Mat Sabu sues Harakah for defamation

KUALA LUMPUR (Dec 1): Former defence minister Mohamad Sabu has filed a defamation suit against a Harakah columnist, its chief editor and publisher over an article that was published on its website, Harakahdaily, in September.

Mohamad, also known as Mat Sabu, filed the suit through the legal firm of Messrs  Amin Amirul & Partners at the High Court here on Oct 28.

The defendants named in the suit are Harakah columnist Roslan Shahir Mohd Shahir, chief editor Wan Nordin Wan Yaacob and publisher of its newspaper and website, Galeri Media Serbanika Sdn Bhd.

Checks with the court found that the case had been set for case management before High Court deputy registrar Idamasliza Maarof on Jan 7.

In the statement of claim, Mohamad, who is Parti Amanah Negara (Amanah) president, claimed that on Sept 14, all the defendants, had together and separately degraded, humiliated, defamed or embarrassed him by writing and publishing defamatory words against him on the Harakahdaily website through an article with the title, “Husam: PAN Parti Diktator”.

The Kota Raja Member of Parliament claimed that the defamatory words, among others, meant that he is a dictator, had abused his position as a party president and a party president who only followed instructions by DAP.

He also claimed that the defamatory words written by the first defendant (Roslan Shahir) were a source for the second defendant (Wan Nordin) to report and allow the article on it to be published on the Harakahdaily website, a media portal that favours PAS, one of the parties in the coalition government.

Mohamad claimed that the defamatory words were mala fide against him and were aimed at undermining and degrading him and his credibility as a person with good image, reputation and integrity.

He claimed that on Sept 24, a notice was sent to all the defendants seeking them to withdraw the defamatory words and apologise, but none did.

He is seeking general, aggravated and exemplary damages, interests and an order to compel the defendants to apologise and withdraw the defamatory words against him, as well as an injunction to restrain all defendants or their agents from republishing the words.