Kan-Dapaah Pursue Bature over defamatory publication

By Felix Engsalige Nyaaba

Hon. Albert Kan Daapah, Member of Parliament for Sekyere East in the Ashanti Region,  has dragged Alhaji Bature Iddrisu , the Managing Editor of the Al-hajji  newspaper  before an Accra Fast Track High Court  for  defamatory  publication against him.

Hon Kan Dapaah is seeking punitive and aggravated damages of GH¢500,000.00, as well as general damages and costs, inclusive of counsel’s fees.

Also in the suit are, Benjamin Essuman, and Harzet Company limited, the publisher of the Al-Haji newspaper.

The MP  is seeking for  an order directed at  defendants  to retract the defamatory statement published in the defendants Tuesday, February 14, 2012 edition of the Al-hajii   newspaper  with the headlines, “Insightful true account of Asem Darkey& the missing 77 parcel of of cocaine  ...NPP Governement  complicity on cocaine , Part1, Ken Agyepong, Kan Dapaah and others have questions to answer.”

Hon.Kan- Dapaah is also seeking for an order directed at the defendant, restraining either by themselves, their agents, servants, assigns, representatives from further publishing or causing to be published defamatory statement or scandalous words against him.

In addition to that, he is asking the court to make Alhajo Bature Iddrisu and Benjamin Essuman to offer an unqualified public apology in a like manner and of the same prominence given to the publication concerning the statement they made against him on the Al-Haji newspaper, dated February 14, 2012.

Hon. Kan- Dapaah , in his statement of claim in a suit filed at an Accra Fast Track  High Court by  Egbert Faibille Jnr, of Kulendi@Law  Chambers, said that Alhaji Bature Iddrisu and Benjamin Essuman  wrote and caused to be published against him and are there fore jointly and severally  liable for the damage caused to his reputation.

According to him, the defendants  statements and publication  were all calculated to cause hatred, disparage , ridicule and injure his hard earned reputation in Ghana and internationally and in the minds of right thinking members of society , and therefore affects his standing in society and in political circle.

He said that, the said defendants acted maliciously in publishing the said libelous and defamatory words, which were designed to cause hatred, ridicule and public anxiety about him and also injure his hard earned reputation.

The plaintiff averts that the defendants knew and ought to have known that the said publication were false and would cause an irreparable damage to his reputation and integrity as the general public would see him as a person in the complicit in the missing cocaine scandal, a dealer in narcotic drugs and a friend to the cocaine suspect, Asem Darkey.

Hon. Kan Dapaah avers that the words of defendants in their natural and ordinary meaning referred to him as an irresponsible politician and person who do not have the interest of the fight against drug menace, which has become a huge problem for the country.

He states that by reason of the publication of Bature’s and Essuman’s words, he had been brought into public scandal, odium and contempt.