00:02The Court of Appeal has reduced a multi-million ringgit defamation award involving former Health Minister Kairi Jamaluddin.
00:10Last year, the High Court ordered preacher Mohammad Rashik Mohammad Alwi, better known as Ustaz Abu Shafiq,
00:17to pay Kairi 2.5 million ringgit in damages after finding him liable for defamation over social media posts related
00:24to the COVID-19 vaccine.
00:26Mohammad Rashik appealed, and on Thursday, a three-judge panel, led by Justice Datuk Mohammad Zaini Mazlan,
00:34revised the payout to 830,000 ringgit, plus 50,000 ringgit in legal costs.
00:41General damages were cut from 2 million to 500,000 ringgit.
00:46Exemplary damages dropped from 250,000 to 80,000.
00:50But aggravated damages of 250,000 ringgit were left unchanged.
00:55On why damages were still reduced, despite the seriousness of the case,
01:01Justice Mohammad Zaini put it plainly.
01:04Defamation damages are meant to compensate, not to make someone wealthy.
01:09The Court also had strong words for Ustaz Abu Shafiq specifically.
01:13The public, the Court said, naturally trusts the words of religious figures,
01:18which makes it all the more serious when that trust is abused.
01:23The panel also noted that his apologies appeared insincere, bordering on sarcasm,
01:28which is why the aggravated damages were kept in full.
01:34The Capitol fell inside a lot of the Sunblock, which means the most of the information
01:38of the current citizens were not able to keep the kennt.
01:38The Second Amendment is a town of the Red Assum.
01:38Theєv 후, and the Sunblock.
01:41You
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