1. ) Dato' Sri Dr. Mohamad Salleh Bin Ismail 2. ) NATIONAL FEEDLOT CORPORATION SDN BHD v Mohd Rafizi Bin Ramli
Catchwords
i. The law of defence of fair comment in defamation is settled. The ambit of the law requires only comments or inferences of fact forming the substratum of facts that is relied, must be truly stated and existing at least in general terms in order for a defendant to succeed in using the defence. The facts truly stated and existing is a sufficient proof against plaintiff's allegation of malice. ii. The veracity of the facts relied is not required under this law since the defence of fair comment is different as opposed to the defence of justification. Keywords: Law of defamation - defence - fair comment - whether impugned statements are defamatory - distinction between facts and comment - whether impugned statements are comments based on inferences of facts - facts truly stated - facts existing - substratum of facts - opinion honestly made - issue of malice - Joshua Benjamin Jeyaretnam v Goh Chok Tong [1989] 3 MLJ 1 - Hunt v Star Newspaper Co. Ltd [1908] 2 KB 309 - Kemsley v Foot & Ors [1952] 1 All ER 501 - Joseph and others v Spiller and another (Associated Newspaper Ltd and others intervening) [2011] 1 AC 852
Practice Areas
Judgment
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