A Bukit Koman villager has won her case against the defamation suit filed by Raub Australian Gold Mining (RAGM) against the Ban Cyanide Action Group (BCAC).

The High Court in Kuala Lumpur ruled today that RAGM failed to prove that BCAC vice-chairperson Hue Shieh Lee's statement against the gold mine was of malicious falsehood.

In handing out the 45-page judgment, High Court judge Yeoh Wee Siam also ordered the plaintiff to pay RM20,000 in costs to Shieh Lee, subject to payment of an allocatur fee of four percent of the costs.

The plaintiff must establish three elements to prove malicious falsehood in this case, namely:

1. That the defendant has published about the plaintiff words which are false;
2. That they were published maliciously; and
3. That special damage has followed as the direct and natural result of their publication.

"... the plaintiff did not prove that the survey results read out by the defendant are false because the plaintiff failed to call any, or all of the 383 residents, to prove that they did not suffer from any health problems as a result of the plaintiff's use of cyanide in its operation of the gold mine.

"... the plaintiff did not call the reporter, who purportedly interviewed the defendant, as a witness to prove that the defendant had uttered or published those words.

"It follows that the issue whether the words are false does not arise," read the judgment...