Information Communication and Culture Minister Dr Rais Yatim today won his dafamatory suit against a blogger over an article on him.

“After going through the evidence and submissions from counsel for the plaintiff and defendant,  I have no choice but to find the defendant liable for defamation,” held High Court Judge Zabariah Mohd Yusof.

She set tomorrow to hear submissions from the two parties for assessment of damages.

NONE On Jan 1, Rais filed the suit against Amizudin Ahmat ( right ), 42, who is also a Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) Youth committee member, over an article posted in the latter’s blog, sharpshooterblogger.blogspot. com , on or about Dec 28 last year.

Rais, 69, in his statement of claim said the entire words in the Malay language article were malicious and defamatory of him and the words in the article meant and/or were understood to mean that he was guilty of a serious offence of having raped and capable of murdering his Indonesian maid.

Rais, who is the Member of Parliament for Jelebu in Negri Sembilan, denied the allegations after a blogger named him.

Subsequently, a woman who worked as a maid for him for eight years was reported by an Indonesian news portal to have denied that she had ever been mistreated or raped by her employer.

After the ruling, Rais, who was present with his wife Masnah Rais, told reporters he had always been confident in the country’s judicial system.

He said he was forced to bring the matter to court in order to clear his name as well as his family's, and to restore the government’s reputation.

In today’s proceedings, Amizudin was his own sole witness while Rais was not called, as both parties had agreed at the last proceedings that the article had indeed been posted and the contents aimed at Rais.

Under cross-examination by Rais’ counsel, Muhammad Shafee Abdullah, Amizudin said prior to posting the article in his blog, he did not obtain confirmation of its truth from Rais, his (Rais’) wife or Rais’ former housemaid, the alleged victim.

Jakarta trip to search for a witness

        

Amizudin said five months after the suit by Rais, he went to Jakarta, Indonesia on May 18-20 to look for a witness.

He said he met with one Indah Utami, a writer assigned by Migrant Care, an Indonesian non-governmental organisation that looked after the welfare of Indonesians working outside the country, who had interviewed the alleged victim.

However, he said he did not talk to the alleged victim as he could not locate her house.

NONE He said he went to Jakarta accompanied by a friend, Cikgu Bard, whose full name is Badrulhisham Shaari ( left ), a PKR member from Rembau, and another person whose name he could not recall.

When put to him by Muhammad Shafee that Cikgu Bard was a political enemy of Rais’, he replied that he did not know but acknowledged that the two were not friends.

He told the court that all he did was ‘cut and paste’ the article which was published in the Harakah Daily based on a report by Migrant Care on Aug 1, 2007.

He also did not think a Migrant Care representative or the alleged victim would be willing to appear in court to testify because they were afraid to come to the country.

- Bernama