Popular lawyer sends important message to Anas - Adomonline.com

“Luckily the decision of the High Court is not final and the plaintiff instead of issuing sentimental public statements should rather disect the judgement and identify the relevant grounds for appeal albeit knowing that he may either win or lose the appeal,” he said.

Now on the substantive case of defamation, the plaintiff has a burden to prove the following: that there was a publication; that the publication was referrable to the plaintiff and that the publication was defamatory in the sense that it brings the person of the plaintiff into disrepute or opprobrium.

It seems to me upon reading the judgement that the plaintiff in this case positively proved publication, established the defamatory nature of the words used in the said publication.

Mind you my dear reader that in this case the plaintiff did not show his identity to the court.

Notwithstanding inconsistencies in the evidence of plaintiff regarding the identity of the plaintiff, the judge relied rightly on innuendos to determine that the publications were referrable to the plaintiff.

It seems the court accepted the defences of the defendant to the effect that the publications may carry in their belly defamatory statements but was of the view that the plaintiff has no reputation for the defendant to bring into disrepute.

In this vein, I will plead with the surrogates of the plaintiff not to resurrect the fact that an interim judge was asked to continue and conclude the case.