KUALA LUMPUR: Former prime minister Muhyiddin Yassin’s defence to a defamation suit brought by Lim Guan Eng was a mere “sham”, the High Court heard today.
Muhyiddin is being sued for claiming that Lim, in his capacity as finance minister in the Pakatan Harapan government, revoked the tax exemption given to Muslim charitable organisation Yayasan Al-Bukhary.
In an opening statement, lawyer Guok Ngek Seong said that Muhyiddin had, in pleading the defence of justification, claimed that Lim refused to honour the exemption given to the charity when he held the finance portfolio between May 2018 and February 2020.
Guok also said Muhyiddin’s defence claimed that following his appointment as prime minister, he received a letter from the foundation’s chairman Syed Mokhtar Al-Bukhary asking that the Inland Revenue Board (LHDN) restore its tax-exempt status.
Guok said Lim would, in the course of the trial, prove that Muhyiddin’s defences were untrue.
He said Muhyiddin had been well aware of the actual content of Syed Mokhtar’s letter dated Feb 5, 2021 prior to publishing three defamatory statements.
“Syed Mokhtar’s letter was crystal clear that the issue of the revocation of tax was made when Muhyiddin was the prime minister,” he said.
Guok said the letter read that the revocation had been made “recently”, and that this could only mean that it happened when Muhyiddin was prime minister.
Guok said Muhyiddin had used Lim as a scapegoat.
“Let’s push the blame to Lim and see whether it works. That has to be the defendant’s (Muhyiddin’s) intention,” he said.
He said Muhyiddin had repeatedly published statements defamatory of Lim in the name of politics and for his political survival – thrice within the space of a week.
“An offer (for Muhyiddin) to retract and apologise to the plaintiff (Lim) was also thrown in the garbage when the defendant refused to take up the offer,” said Guok.
He said this was a fit and proper case for Lim to be awarded aggravated, exemplary and punitive damages.
Besides the defence of justification, Muhyiddin has also pleaded the defence of fair comment and qualified privilege.
Lim filed the suit on March 27 last year, seeking an apology and retraction from Muhyiddin for the three allegedly defamatory statements.
Muhyiddin was alleged to have accused Lim on March 9 of being involved in the previous government’s decision to revoke the tax exemption previously given to Yayasan Al-Bukhary. The statement was alleged to have been made shortly after Muhyiddin was released from arrest by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission.
Guok said the second statement, made in a media release on March 11, alleged that Lim had imposed a tax on the foundation and a 45% penalty on tax payable for preceding years.
Lim also accused Muhyiddin of telling the media after the Bersatu president had delivered his winding-up speech at the party’s annual general assembly on March 12 that since LHDN was under Lim’s purview at the time, any instructions to cancel the foundation’s tax exemption must have come from him.
Lim said the statements, in their natural and ordinary meaning, were meant to show that he had abused his position and power by authorising the imposition of taxes and penalties on a welfare foundation.
He said the statements were also meant to depict him as racist, anti-Malay, anti-Islam and a vindictive person, and that Muhyiddin had acted in bad faith.
Lim will take the stand this afternoon before judicial commissioner Roz Mawar Rozain.
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