PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, CMC -The Court of Appeal Wednesday ordered the leader of the minor opposition, Progressive Empowerment Party (PEP), Phillip Edward Alexander, to pay Finance Minister Colm Imbert more than half a million dollars (One TT dollar=US$0.16 cents) in damages for defamation.
Justices of Appeal Mark Mohammed, Ronnie Boodoosingh, and Geoffrey Henderson upheld the ruling of Justice Jacqueline Wilson, describing it as “unassailable” after Imbert had sued Alexander over a series of posts on Facebook, published between February 29 and March 1, 2020.
The Court of Appeal also ordered Alexander to pay Imbert’s costs in its unanimous ruling.
“Respectfully, we are not persuaded that the trial judge materially erred by failing to adopt an impressionistic interpretation of the seven publications involved (or) by failing to examine and evaluate each of the seven publications separately and apart from the other publications and in isolated compartments,” the Court ruled.
It said even if the lower Court was incorrect in its conclusion, and while the Appeal Court judges were not required to look at the matter afresh, their conclusion “would be the same as that of the trial judge.”
Senior Counsel Russell Martineau, one of the lawyers representing Imbert, had described the Facebook posts as “grossly defamatory” and that their inferential meaning would lead a reasonable reader to conclude that “something underhanded went on here.”
“They were not just harmful or hurtful statements but suggested criminal conduct…These are serious allegations to make of the Minister of Finance. What impression would the reasonable reader get?”
Martineau said the posts were based on a “false presumption” regarding purchasing a vehicle, adding, “But this was not so.”
The attorney said a constitutional right to privacy existed and that “people’s reputations are significant.
“It does not matter if you are a minister. You have to respect people’s privacy. There is a line. This was not possible. It was more than that. It is the man’s reputation that is being tarnished.”
The Court of Appeal said there was “compelling justification” to examine the seven postings collectively rather than separately, as Alexander’s attorney, Gregory Armorer, argued.
“Armorer’s submissions are respectfully a highly technical one, which cannot withstand scrutiny against the backdrop of the specific and actual context of this case.”
The judges said that in deciding the appeal, they could not look at the posts separately because of the “very narrow window involved” – approximately 24 hours – the medium used and the “manifest interrelation of the posts.
“Even if required to view the posts individually, most of them, in our view, would carry defamatory meaning.”
Following the 2023 High Court ruling, Imbert posted on X that he had received a TT$525,000 award for defamation against Alexander.
“He had falsely alleged that I purchased an exotic Swedish sports car for US$2M using forex that I obtained by corrupt means or by abusing my office as the MOF,” Imbert wrote.
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