As Compensation For Defamatory, Kaduna Court Orders Newspaper To Pay Gov El-Rufai 10 Million

A excessive courtroom in Kaduna has ordered At present Publishing Firm, publishers of The Union newspaper, to pay N10m as damages for defaming Nasir El-Rufai, governor of the state.

 

The excessive courtroom additionally ordered the corporate to tender a public apology to the governor that should be printed in nationwide dailies.

El-Rufai had sued the newspaper for publishing false claims after The Union newspaper had on July 2, 2015, printed a frontpage story saying that the governor had declared property value N90bn and 40 mansions.

Within the judgment delivered on Monday, November 1, Mairo Muhammed, the presiding decide, additionally warned the defendants from additional defaming El-Rufai.

The courtroom held that El-Rufai had proven that the offending materials was printed to 3rd events by the defendants.

“The plaintiff had satisfactorily proven that he didn’t declare property value N90bn and 40 mansions, the implication of which is that the phrases have been false and defamatory of the plaintiff,” the decide held.

 

AbdulHakeem Mustapha, El-Rufai’s lawyer, described the judgment as “a properly thought-about judgment which was replete with trade and erudition”.

Reacting to the courtroom’s verdict, the governor mentioned the “the liberty to publish is just not a license to defame individuals or dress rumour-mongering and malice as journalism”.

 

El-Rufai mentioned he “approached the courtroom and personally testified within the case as an indication of his perception within the rule of regulation, a stance he has taken in securing apologies from different newspapers for libel and which informs his continued pursuit of different situations of defamation within the courts”.