DAP's Bandar Kuching MP Chong Chieng Jen has been granted leave to appeal by the Federal Court on whether federal or state governments can sue individuals for defamation.

He is appealing against a decision by the Court of Appeal, which had ruled that governments can indeed sue for defamation.

That landmark decision was based on Section 3 of the Government Proceedings Act, which states that governments have the right to sue as an ordinary citizen.

"That (decision) means any state government or even federal government can sue for defamation.

"It raises an important point of public interest particularly with regard to free speech under Article 10 of the Federal Constitution," said Chong's counsel Ranjit Singh to reporters at the Federal Court in Putrajaya today.

Chong had been sued for defamation by the Sarawak state government following his remarks made in a media and a DAP leaflet alleging that RM11 billion of public funds had disappeared into a “black hole”.

The Kuching High Court had dismissed the suit after Chong filed a preliminary objection on the state government's capacity to sue for defamation, though this decision was later overruled by the Court of Appeal.

Three questions

Ranjit told reporters today that they will be raising three questions in their appeal before the Federal Court.

The first would be whether the Government Proceedings Act, in particular Section 3, prevents the principle in the Derbyshire County Council v Times Newspaper Ltd & Ors landmark case to be applied to state governments, he said.

The outcome of the Derbyshire case in 1993, he explained, meant that local authorities cannot institute libel actions.

His second question would be whether Section 3(1)(c) of the Civil Law Act prevents the principle in the Derbyshire case to be extended to the Sarawak state government.

Lastly, he would also like to challenge whether a party who had entered various defences would be deemed to have abandoned all their other defences after making an application on parts of their defence under Order 14A of the Rules of Court (ROC) 2012.

This last question, he explained, was raised due to the Court of Appeal's decision to immediately enter judgement without trial against Chong after overruling the High Court's decision on the state government's capacity to sue for defamation.

"We had other defences, like fair comment and qualified privilege.

"Our preliminary objection was only on the state government's capacity to sue (for defamation).

"(After the Court of Appeal's decision on that particular objection) they skipped the remaining defences and entered judgement without trial," Chong said.

Ranjit said that if this decision stays, no one would use Order 14A of the ROC again, as it would mean they would lose all their other defences.