The High Court in Kuala Lumpur has granted leave for National Feedlot Corporation Sdn Bhd and its chairperson Mohd Salleh Ismail to file an application for committal proceedings against Pandan MP Mohd Rafizi Ramli.

This is for supposedly violating an injunction issued against Rafizi not to repeat allegedly defamatory statements on Salleh’s purchase of properties at KL Eco City.

“The articles unfortunately are still published, so we had to file an application for committal against Rafizi.

“The articles concerned in our application are basically articles that had already been published before the judgment, and I think there is one after the judgment,” lawyer Nor Hafeez Nurul Hadi, who represented Salleh, said.

He was speaking to Malaysiakini after proceedings in chambers with High Court judge Nik Hasmat Nik Mohamad this morning, where the leave was granted.

Hafeez explained that he would now have 14 days to file the application for committal.

Salleh had sued Rafizi and Malaysiakini for defamatory statements made by Rafizi that were subsequently published by the news portal.

The High Court subsequently ordered Rafizi to pay RM150,000 to Salleh and RM50,000 to NFC as damages. They were also awarded costs of RM100,000.

Malaysiakini was accorded the defence of reportage, and NFC and Salleh were ordered to pay RM50,000 as costs to the news portal.

However, the court in its Oct 31 decision last year, also granted an injunction against both defendants from repeating the statement.

Rafizi had indicated that he intends to appeal against the decision.