KUALA LUMPUR (March 8): The Court of Appeal (COA) on Tuesday (March 8) dismissed an appeal by Sungai Besar Umno division chief Datuk Seri Jamal Md Yunos in the defamation suit against him by Petaling Jaya Member of Parliament Maria Chin Abdullah. But the amount of damages previously awarded by the High Court to Maria was reduced from RM300,000 to RM150,000.

A three-man panel consisting of Justices Datuk Abdul Karim Abdul Jalil, Datuk Gunalan Muniandy and Datuk Ahmad Zaidi Ibrahim were unanimous in their decision delivered online via Zoom on Tuesday morning.

Reading out the judgement, Justice Ahmad Zaidi said: "On the issue of liability, we find no merits in the defendant's appeal. We therefore dismiss the defendant's appeal against liability. The decision of the High Court on liability is affirmed."

On the issue of damages, the judge said that the court found RM300,000 to be "manifestly excessive".

"We are of the view that the RM300,000 awarded in this case was manifestly excessive. We are of the view that RM150,000 is a reasonable amount," he said.

The panel also ordered Jamal to pay RM10,000 in costs. 

On Oct 31, 2018, High Court Judge Datuk Mohd Zaki Abdul Wahab found that Jamal had made defamatory statements against Maria and ordered him to pay the former Bersih 2.0 chairman RM300,000 in damages. He was also ordered to pay RM40,000 in costs.

Among others, Justice Mohd Zaki found that Jamal's statements made in 2016 were defamatory and that the latter had failed to prove the facts of his comments.

Maria filed the suit in October 2016, alleging that Jamal, who was also the leader of the so-called "Red Shirts" group, had claimed that the polls reform group was infiltrated by the Islamic State (IS).

In delivering its decision on Tuesday morning, the panel noted that as Jamal had admitted to uttering and publishing the two statements, the core matters to be determined before the panel were whether the statements referred directly to Maria and if they were indeed defamatory.

Jamal previously also argued that he did not mention Maria's name in the statements. However, the panel found that "there was more than enough evidence" to show that Maria indeed was the subject of the statements.

"It is true that no person acquainted with the plaintiff vis-a-vis Bersih 2.0 was called to testify [during the trial]. However, based on the facts adduced, we find that circumstantially, there is more than enough evidence to support the plaintiff's claim relating to this issue," said the panel, adding that Jamal had failed to show that the trial judge had erred in this regard.

Apart from the claim that Bersih was infiltrated by the IS, Jamal also claimed that Bersih had planned to "infiltrate and disrupt" operations at the Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) and klia2. The panel found that all these statements would "subject [Maria] to hatred".

"We agree with the learned trial judge finding that the above statements would to a reasonable man have the effect of lowering the plaintiff's reputation in the eyes of society and subject her to hatred," they ruled.

They also agreed with the trial judge that in his defence of fair comment and qualified privilege, Jamal had failed to prove that his statements were factually true.

The panel also noted that this is a broad judgement, while the detailed, complete grounds of the judgement will be prepared in due course.

Maria was represented by lawyers Datuk Dr Gurdial Singh Nijar, Ngeow Chow Ying and Abraham Au.

Jamal, on the other hand, was represented by lawyers Mohamad Fauzi Abdul Samad and V Mugunthan.