Caruana Galizia wins five libels over PN contracts allegation

One article that gave rise to no less than five libel suits has turned out to be costly for Maltese language newspaper Kullħadd and EU funds and social dialogue Parliamentary Secretary Aaron Farrugia.

Daphne Caruana Galizia's heirs and lawyer Andrew Borg Cardona have won several related libel cases which they had originally instituted against Toni Abela, now a judge, when he was editor of the Labour newspaper Kullħadd and against Aaron Farrugia, who is now a parliamentary secretary.

Peter Caruana Galizia and Andrew Borg Cardona had filed court proceedings after an article published in Kullħadd in August 2014 alleged that the two were shareholders in a company which received €2.5 million in government contracts by the Nationalist government and had received some €80,000.

Aleander Balzan had stepped into Abela’s shoes as the new editor when Abela became a judge and assumed responsibility for the cases.

Magistrate Francesco Depasquale was scathing in his judgment, pointing out that the author of the article, who was never named, “chose to give the impression that  Caruana Galizia and Borg Cardona had benefited from large contracts...It emerges however that although the author had every opportunity to verify the documentation… .he had failed to tell his readers that actually, the applicants had 25% shareholding each in the company BCGL Services limited, which offers fiduciary services.” It had also failed to point out that the shares were being held on a trustee basis.

It was clear that the writer wanted to give the impression that the applicants had personally benefited from the money, but had been incapable of presenting any evidence of this in court, said the magistrate.

On the other hand, the two lawyers had shown that over a period of six years, their company BCGL Services was only paid just over €5,000 for a nominee shareholding.

"It is therefore clear that everything claimed by the writer was absolutely untrue where it involved the respondents personally. The allegations cannot be seen as being fair comment, as claimed by the defendants," the court said.

“In today’s era, where society is manipulated by social media, which is being used increasingly as a tool for misinformation and fearmongering by those who want to harm society for their personal benefit...the importance of serious and investigative journalism takes a more serious shade,” said the court. Journalists had to be means by which the truth reached the ordinary reader, who must be assured of the sincerity and honesty of the journalist’s work.

Balzan was condemned to pay €3,000.

In a related case, Daphne Caruana Galizia had instituted proceedings against Aaron Farrugia for having claimed on Twitter and Facebook that the two lawyers had benefited from contracts of €2.5 million under the PN government.

“The defendant claimed to have done nothing but reproduce what was written in Kullħadd. This defence doesn’t hold water,” said the court, which held that a public endorsement of a public comment is something on could be held accountable for.

The allegations were substantially incorrect, held the court, which dismissed the defendant’s attempt to justify the social media posts by saying that he had been attacked by Caruana Galizia in the past as childish.

The magistrate condemned the manipulation of the public via social media saying that “every politician, more so MPs,must be examples to the public and use social media to share correct information, not to increase hate and polarization.”

Farrugia was also ordered to pay €3,000.