Court of Appeal Judge Linton Albert today recused himself from hearing an appeal brought by Bintulu Member of Parliament Tiong King Sing with regard to a defamation suit.

Albert, who chaired a three-member Court of Appeal panel, said another panel would hear the matter as he knew the plaintiff in the case and they were friends.

The court subsequently set March 4 to hear the appeal.

Presiding with Albert were justices Aziah Ali and Anantham Kasinather.

Tiong is appealing against the decision of a high court which had dismissed his application to compel former New Straits Times journalist Joseph Sipalan to disclose his sources for an article he wrote, which was the subject matter in the defamation suit filed by Tiong against former MCA president Ong Tee Keat.

Sipalan had written an article with the heading, ‘Chua and Tiong in cahoots’ which was published in the New Sunday Times on Sept 6, 2009.

In dismissing Tiong’s application on July 31, last year, Justice Lau Bee Lan held that it was in her view that it would be more in the public interest for the court not to order Sipalan to reveal his sources.

In her grounds of judgment, Lau gave six reasons on why the court had decided not to order Sipalan to reveal his sources, and among the reasons were that he had given an undertaking to preserve confidentiality in relation to the sources of information.

Tiong had originally filed the suit on Oct 12, 2009, against The New Straits Times Press Bhd, its former group editor Syed Nadzri Syed Harun, Sipalan and Ong.

He later withdrew his claim against NSTP and two other parties.

Lawyer Bhag Singh appeared for Sipalan while Chan Tse Yuen represented Ong. Tiong was represented by Prem Ramachandran.

- Bernama