Investigative journalist, Anas Aremeyaw Anas says he will seek a review of the High Court’s ruling, dismissing his defamatory suit against Member of Parliament for Assin Central, Kennedy Ohene Agyapong.
In a short broadcast posted on his social media handles, Mr. Anas indicated that he arrived at the decision to seek a review after carefully studying the judgement delivered by the court presided over by Justice Eric Baah J.
According to him, “the judge made an overreach and descended into the arena and made criminal pronouncement about me as if I was standing a criminal trial”.
“He also justified the MP accusing me of murder of the late J. B. Danquah, murder of 20 Chinese nationals and host of other crimes. We are filing an appeal because there was no evidence provided,” he stated.
While appreciating the public for solidarizing with him following the decision of the court, Mr. Anas reiterated that he and his outfit remain committed to the fight against corruption and will not relent despite “attacks on us – from the death of Ahmed to the contestant threats on our lives”.
He also disclosed that he has filed another defamation suit at a court in the United States of America against Mr. Agyapong which is yet to be determined.
The investigative journalist, in 2018, dragged Mr. Agyapong to court over allegations he levelled against him (Mr. Anas) following the premiere of his ‘Number 12’ documentary, which exposed corruption in football administration in Ghana and other African countries.
Anas Aremeyaw Anas argued, in his statement of claim, that the Assin Central MP made claims on media platforms that defamed him and prayed the court to order the MP to pay him an amount of GH₵25 million as compensation for damages caused him as result of the alleged defamatory publication.
But the court, in a ruling delivered on Wednesday, March 15, 2023, dismissed the suit against Mr. Agyapong.
According to an online publication by Accra-based Asaase Radio, the court held that the plaintiff, Mr. Anas failed to prove that the MP defamed him by airing his documentary, ‘ Who Watches the Watchman’. Rather, the documentary exposed shady deals the investigative journalist and his associates were involved in.
The court, the publication added, further held that Mr. Agyapong provided enough evidence to prove that Mr. Anas used findings of his works to solicit money from implicated persons and exempted those who were able to pay the monies he demanded.
It said the court concluded that what Mr. Anas is engaged in is not investigative journalism but investigative terrorism and that Mr. Agyapong was justified to call him “a blackmailer, corrupt, an extortionist, and evil”.
