KUALA LUMPUR – Kedah Menteri Besar Datuk Seri Muhammad Sanusi Md Nor did not claim Berjaya Group founder Tan Sri Vincent Tan is a corrupt man nor brought up Berjaya Land Bhd (BLB) in any of his speeches, according to a statement of defence filed by the PAS leader.
Sanusi, through his statement of defence filed at the high court here on September 29, added that he had never claimed Tan and the company wanted to con the people of Selangor and Malaysians.
“The defendant (Sanusi) is only raising issues related to governance and leakage in Pakatan Harapan-Barisan Nasional (PH-BN) administration, especially the Selangor menteri besar.
“(However), the defendant did not use any vulgar, extreme or vile words in his speech nor intended to damage both the plaintiffs’ images.”
Sanusi also said he has the moral and social responsibility to expose any issues of governance and leakages that occur in the PH-BN administration.
He also took a swing at news reports on the alleged speech in the suit, saying that any snippets, cuts, edits, titles, descriptions and additions reported in the media were made without prior permission and that he was not responsible for them.
“The defendant’s speech needs to be heard and observed in its entirety. The excerpts taken by the plaintiffs do not reflect the entire tone, meaning and true context of the speech.”
Sanusi, however, defended his statement that were related to the appointment of a company as the lead developer for the Klang river upgrading project, known as the Selangor Maritime Gateway as true.
Tan and his company Berjaya Land filed the defamation suit against Sanusi at the high court here on August 8 this year.
The two plaintiffs claimed that Sanusi, during the Jelajah Mega PN Best/PN Best Sayangi Kedah Sejahtera mega tour on August 2, had made false and baseless allegations against Tan and his company in his speech.
The legal action came after Sanusi’s comments regarding the RM700 million river-widening SMG project during his speech in conjunction with the ‘PN Best Mega Tour’ election campaign at Dataran Darulaman, Jitra, Kedah on August 2.
As a result, Tan and Berjaya Land have demanded a range of compensatory measures from Sanusi, including general damages, aggravated damages, and exemplary damages. They have sought an injunction order to restrain the defendant from making further defamatory statements.
In the claim, Tan and Berjaya Land contended that Sanusi’s speech was live-streamed and subsequently shared on various platforms, including Astro Awani’s YouTube account, PAS TV’s Facebook account, and KiniTV’s YouTube account.
Among others, Sanusi allegedly referred to Tan as the “tauke” or boss of the then caretaker Selangor Menteri Besar Datuk Seri Amirudin Shari and claimed that Berjaya Land had received 600-acres of land in Selangor, worth RM10 billion, for free.
In a statement on August 4, Berjaya Land Group CEO Syed Ali Shahul Hameed described Sanusi’s statement as “false, malicious, completely without merit, and politically motivated”.
Berjaya Land clarified that while the company wasn’t explicitly named, the statement could be construed as referring to the company. – October 2, 2023
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