Today there is a complete blackout in Utusan Malaysia of yesterday’s Penang High Court judgment against the UMNO-owned newspaper for defamation against Penang Chief Minister and DAP Secretary-General Lim Guan Eng for its article “Kebiadaban Lim Guan Eng” published on 20th December 2010 and the order by the judge Justice George Varughese that Utusan pay general and aggravated damages of RM200,000 plus costs of RM25,000.
Who would have doubted that it would be front-page headline story in Utusan Malaysia today if Utusan had won the defamation suit against Guan Eng?
Although the Utusan Malaysia’s irresponsible blackout of the Varughese judgment because it was not in its favour is not unexpected, it serves to confirm how irresponsible and trashy a newpaper Utusan Malaysia has become in the past three years.
Isn’t the UMNO President, Datuk Seri Najib Razak to be responsible for how extremist, unprofessional, racist and anti-1Malaysia the UMNO newspaper Utusan Malaysia had degenerated to in the past 32 months since he became UMNO President and Prime Minister in April 2009, coining his “1Malaysia, People First, Performance Now” slogan?
As UMNO President and Prime Minister, will Najib apologise for Utusan Malaysia’s racist and defamatory attack on Lim Guan Eng and rein in Utusan’s extremist and anti-1Malaysia rampage of lies and falsehoods?
Najib must take serious note that Penang High Court judge Justice Varughese has found that that neither the Penang Chief Minister, the DAP nor the Pakatan Rakyat Penang State Government are anti-Malay or anti-Islam as falsely and maliciously claimed by Utusan Malaysia.
In his judgment, Justice Varghese found that there was no basis for Utusan’s “rash and irresponsible” claim that the Chief Minister was a racist and opposed anything connected with the Malays.
The judge found that the claim that the Chief Minister made a racist speech attacking the Malays and Malay institutions was clearly unbelievable, when there was no evidence that the audience, which mainly consisted of Malays, were offended by the speech.
In addition, the judge found that Utusan’s seven allegations that the Chief Minister:
*was oppressing the Malays and was wiping out Penang Malay villages one by one from the face of the earth;
*had cancelled or prevented the Maulidur Rasul procession in 2010 (which actually took place);
*had prevented Malay traders from operating in KOMTAR during Ramadan;
*had demolished the stalls of Malay traders;
*had used money from gambling to fund the RM100 payments to warga emas;
*had demolished Malay villages at Kg Jalan Pokok Asam and Kg Genting, Balik Pulau; and
*had evicted Indian villagers from Kg Buah Pala;
were all unsupported by the facts, and were based on distorted information and “half-truths”.
The judge also found that such “half-truths” were in fact “no truth at all”, held that the allegations were malicious, intended to mislead readers, made in bad faith and that Utusan Malaysia had practised a “selective vendetta” to unfairly malign the Chief Minister and the DAP.
As Utusan Malaysia is UMNO newspaper, Malaysians are entitled to know from Najib as the UMNO President whether he proposes to “clean house” to ensure that Utusan Malaysia stop its extremist, racist and anti-1Malaysia rampage of lies and falsehoods against DAP and Pakatan Rakyat leaders or he remains exposed as a Prime Minister who does not walk the talk with UMNO-owned Utusan Malaysia the biggest national opponent of his 1Malaysia campaign.