The High Court in Kuala Lumpur has fixed Sept 28 to deliver its decision on a defamation suit filed by National Feedlot Corporation (NFC) Sdn Bhd chairperson Mohamad Salleh Ismail against PKR secretary general Rafizi Ramli and portal Malaysiakini.

Judicial commissioner Azizul Azmi Adnan fixed the date after hearing submissions from all parties today.

NFC was represented by lawyer David Morais while Rafizi was represented by Razlan Hadri Zulkifli and Ranjit Singh. Lawyer K Shanmuga appeared for Malaysiakini.

Shanmuga told the court that the suit should be dismissed against the portal as it tried to verify Rafizi's claims with the plaintiffs, and even contacted NFC's public relations firm GRA Communications Sdn Bhd.

"The plaintiff (Salleh) failed to answer until he was put to the witness stand," said Malaysiakini's lawyer.

Shanmuga said Rafizi's claims warranted a news report as the NFC project was newsworthy and of public interest.

He said he hoped the court would uphold the principles of freedom of speech and freedom of the press by dismissing the suit.

Razlan said his client, Rafizi, pleaded the defence of fair comment as NFC had in the past used the RM250 million soft loan given by the government to purchase various properties in Bangsar and also in Singapore.

He also said that Salleh's son, who is a director of the company, also admitted that buying properties was a way for the company to get returns rather than savings.

“Even the plaintiff's lawyer had said in his submission that Rafizi's opinions or conclusions denote that my client was making a comment,” he said.

The lawyer said it was not disputed that in March 2012, when the statements were made by Rafizi, other political figures and the public had expressed concerns over possible abuse of the funds.

Salleh is suing Rafizi and Malaysiakini for defamation. In his suit, Salleh alleged that at a press conference on March 7, 2012, the PKR politician had claimed that he (Salleh) had used the RM74.1 million fixed deposit from a government loan from the NFC project to secure the loan to purchase eight KL Eco City condominiums. This had resulted in him (Salleh) being charged and that the total loan of RM86 million was seized.

The NFC chairperson, however, did not purchase the KL Eco City condominiums despite being granted the loan by Public Bank.

He had previously testified that he and his children could afford to purchase the eight KL Eco City office lots.