PUTRAJAYA (Sept 10): The Federal Court has denied leave for Sarawak Report editor Clare Rewcastle-Brown to appeal the verdict against her in Terengganu Sultanah Nur Zahirah's defamation action involving a book about the multibillion-dollar 1Malaysia Development Bhd (1MDB) scandal.

Heading the three-member panel, Federal Court judge Tan Sri Nallini Pathmanathan said that the investigative reporter's application failed to reach the threshold as set in the Courts of Judicature Act. The panel also found that the questions raised by Rewcastle-Brown were trite, established law, and had no novel issues of law or of public importance which needed to be ventilated further.

In delivering the unanimous decision, Nallini also said that although the significance of Rewcastle-Brown's book, The Sarawak Report: The Inside Story of the 1MDB Exposé “cannot be underplayed”, it by no means give the editor immunity from the law, as she had defamed the Sultanah, who was an unrelated third party. 

“While the significance of the book cannot be underplayed, it does not and cannot provide immunity to the author where there is defamation of a third party,” the apex court judge said.

The judge also said that all parties are equal before the law and subject to equal treatment before the court.

“The respondent equally is entitled to equal treatment at law. The fact that she's a member of a royal family does not preclude her from bringing a claim and being treated as would any member of the public.

“The fact of her background should not be held against her again, as all are equal in the eyes of the law,” Nallini said.

The other judges on the panel were Federal Court judges Datuk Zabariah Mohd Yusof and Datuk Vazeer Alam Mydin Meera.

The court also awarded cost of RM15,000.

Tuesday's decision means that Rewcastle-Brown, along with the other defendants - Gerakbudaya Enterprise publisher Chong Ton Sin and printer Vinlin Press Sdn Bhd - will have to pay damages of RM300,000 to the Sultanah, which was part of the Court of Appeal's (COA) decision in December last year.

The reporter had turned to crowdfunding to raise the sum following the appellate court's decision. However, a quick check on the GoFundMe page revealed that as of Tuesday, only £21,748 (RM123,914) had been raised.

Rewcastle-Brown was represented by Americk Sidhu, while A Vishnu Kumar appeared for the Sultanah on Tuesday.

Rewcastle-Brown was seeking leave to challenge the appellate court's decision last December which allowed the Sultanah's appeal. The COA panel unanimously ruled that a statement made in the book linking the Sultanah to fugitive businessman Low Taek Jho (Jho Low) was defamatory.

The impugned statement reads: “Jho was also friendly with a key player in Terengganu, the wife of the sultan, whose acquiescence was needed to set up the fund, and he later cited her support as having been crucial to his obtaining the advisory position."

In October 2022, the High Court had ruled in favour of Rewcastle-Brown and the other defendants, on the grounds that the statement in question was not defamatory, although there was a case of mistaken identity, where the editor had mistaken the Sultanah for her sister-in-law, Tengku Datuk Rahimah Sultan Mahmud.

In her November 2018 suit, the Sultanah alleged that Rewcastle-Brown made a disparaging statement about her in the book, and that the statement could be taken to mean that she was involved in corrupt practices and interfered with the state’s administration.

The Sultanah also claimed that the statement in the book had linked her as “friendly” with Jho Low and construed her as having helped Jho Low become the adviser of Terengganu Investment Authority, the predecessor of 1MDB.

She had sought, among others, general damages of RM100 million each from the defendants.

During the trial at the High Court, Rewcastle-Brown had testified that she had made an “honest mistake” by naming the Sultanah in the impugned passage, as she had mistaken the Sultanah with her sister-in-law, Tunku Rahimah. She also testified that corrections were made to the passage in the book’s subsequent print runs. 

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