KUALA LUMPUR: Health Minister Datuk Seri Dr Dzulkefly Ahmad's RM5 million libel suit against Datuk Seri Najib Razak which was scheduled to commence today has been postponed to next year.
This was after counsel Datuk S. N. Nair told High Court judicial commissioner Arziah Mohamed Apandi that he had withdrawn himself from representing the Kuala Selangor member of parliament.
Counsel Muhammad Farhan Muhammad Shafee appeared for the former prime minister.
The court then fixed March 5, 6, and 7 next year for the new trial dates.
The court also fixed July 10 for the next case management.
In January 2022, Dzulkefly filed the suit in his personal capacity.
He alleged that Najib had uploaded a defamatory post on his Facebook page on Aug 24, 2020, regarding the issue of cronyism.
The post included a screenshot of a Malay daily Sinar Harian article dated Jan 28, 2019, featuring the plaintiff's face.
Dzulkefly asserted that the statement implied, among other things, that he practised cronyism by offering positions or appointments to relatives without any objective evaluation or assessment of their suitability for government positions.
The plaintiff also claimed that Najib had published the defamatory post with the intention of attacking him personally, damaging his dignity and to humiliate him.
He claimed that it was politically motivated and clearly intended to defame and harm his reputation.
Najib, in his defence filed on March 29, 2022, claimed that the impugned post had no connection to the plaintiff and asserted that it referred to the Pakatan Harapan coalition party.