Milimani Court awards Apostle Ng’ang’a and wife Ksh 2.5M in defamation suit.
Televangelist Apostle James Ng’ang’a and his wife Loise Murugi Maina have been awarded Ksh 2.5 million in general damages in a defamation suit against the Standard Media Group.
The judgement that was passed at a Milimani Commercial Magistrate Court involved an article that was published in 2015 by the media group and portrayed the two as immoral and abusive.
Magistrate H.M. Ng’ang’a found that the January 30, 2015 article published in the Nairobi Newspaper under the headline “Why I’m Divorcing Pastor Ng’ang’a,” contained phrases which were defamatory in nature such as “from thief to man of God,” ” abusive drunkard,” and “womanizer,”
The court ruled that although the publication drew its consent from public court records,the Media group failed the test of qualified privilege as it reported on proceedings that had not been addressed in open court.
“From the perspective of an ordinary and reasonable person, it is apparent that the publication was defamatory, and would otherwise lower the thinking of the Plaintiffs in the eyes of the ordinary, reasonable person,” the judgment read.
The story also featured a picture of the plaintiffs wedding photos and further alleged that Pastor Ng’ang’a had a criminal past. The plaintiff testified that following the report about 1000 people left Neno Evangelism Centre and that the public stain painting the couple as immoral stuck with the public.
The Defendant rebattled relying on their defences of public interest, fair comment and qualified privilege under section 6 and 7 of the defamation act adding that their publication included the use of words such as “alleges” and “claims.”
The court however drew a line on qualified privileges with the magistrate noting:
“Until documents are formally put on the floor or raised in open court or become the subject of attention of the judge they would not be amenable to publication in a newspaper.”
At the time of publication the underlying cases were in their preliminary stages and had not yet been heard.The court also found that the report had been skewed noting that the allegations published were extracted from one party’s pleadings while the other side’s response was not presented. The article had also framed a custody dispute as divorce proceedings.
“This selective publication fails to meet the threshold for journalistic fairness…”, the judgement stated. “….more so when considered in the light of the fact that the proceedings were yet to proceed beyond the preliminary stage,”
While the court awarded the plaintiffs Ksh 2.5 million in general damages, it declined to issue a permanent injunction citing a need to balance constitutional press freedom and the remedies to defamation. The call for a published apology and aggravated damages were also rejected as no demand letter had been issued before the suit.
The Defendant was in turn granted 30 days stay of execution.
