Zahid sues Dr M for defamation over lobbying claim

Umno president Ahmad Zahid Hamidi has filed a defamation suit against former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad.

This is over Mahathir's claim that Zahid had met him to try and get on his good side as the latter anticipated he would be facing criminal charges.

This reportedly occurred before Mahathir took office in 2018 when he said it was clear he would become prime minister.

Mahathir made the remarks during a press conference in Putrajaya on Feb 23. He was responding to a question on whether Zahid had met him while he was prime minister to discuss the latter's corruption court cases.

Zahid, in his statement of claim filed last week, denied ever meeting the Pejuang chairperson to discuss his court cases or any action by enforcement agencies prior to the latter becoming prime minister.

He said the former prime minister's remarks were defamatory and malicious.

Mahathir had on March 2 denied defaming Zahid in a reply to his notice of summons.

Zahid is seeking aggravated and exemplary damages as well as an injunction for Mahathir, his officers, aides or agents from repeating the allegedly defamatory remarks, as well as instructing the nonagenarian to make efforts to delete or edit out recordings of his remarks published by the media. - Mkini