KUALA LUMPUR – Datuk Seri Dr Mujahid Yusof Rawa today succeeded in his bid to strike out a suit filed against him by Kamarul Zaman Yusoff in connection with an article based on the Parit Buntar MP’s statement and published by two news portals.
Lawyer Noorazmir Zakaria, who represented Mujahid, said that high court judge Datuk Rozana Ali Yusoff allowed the application of the former minister in the Prime Minister’s Department to quash the suit, which was filed on October 14 last year.
“The court agreed with the defendant (Mujahid)’s argument that the suit was an abuse of court process. The court also allowed Mujahid’s application for costs of RM5,000,” he said when contacted by reporters after the results of the application made through online proceedings (e-review) today.
Through a writ of summons and statement of claim filed on July 28 last year, Kamarul, 51, claimed that Mujahid, as the defendant, had published two articles based on his statement entitled “Disiplin Ilmu Bukan Sentimen Murahan”, on two online news portals, namely The Malaysian Insight and Malaysia Dateline.
Kamarul, the former director of Universiti Utara Malaysia’s Malaysian Institute of Political Studies, also claimed that the article was posted on both Mujahid’s and Parti Amanah Negara’s (Amanah) Facebook pages.
Kamarul claimed that the defamatory statement implied that he was a racist academician, among others, and that he had ‘attacked’ Amanah as a political party.
The plaintiff asserted that the defamatory statements were untrue and had been published by the defendant with malicious intent, and sought, among others, RM5 million in damages including exemplary damages, costs, and other relief deemed fit by the court. – Bernama, February 17, 2021
