‘Akilisi acquitted on defamation charges [1]
Monday, April 27, 1998 - 10:40. Updated on Thursday, December 3, 2015 - 17:01.
From Matangi Tonga Magazine, Vol. 13, no. 1, April 1998.
Member of Parliament, ‘Akilisi Pohiva, was acquitted on two charges of defaming King Taufa‘ahau Tupou IV, which were brought against him by the Crown.
The charges followed an interview of ‘Akilisi Pohiva by Michael Ybarra of the American Wall Street Journal. The newspaper quoted Pohiva making what the Crown considered to be defamatory statements, claiming: that the King is a dictator, that the King and his nobles are guilty of financial legerdemain, and that the King has ignored requests to account for the funds from the sale of Tongan passports.
Puisne Judge, Mr Justice Finnigan, in the Nuku‘alofa Supreme Court on March 5, noted that all parties in the case agreed that the King governs Tonga in accordance with the Constitution and the Law. “To say that he is a dictator is factually and legally wrong.” However, Mr Justice Finnigan, found that the Crown had failed to prove to the Court beyond reasonable doubt that Pohiva had actually told the reporter some of the remarks. Pohiva denied that he made the defamatory statements. The judge said he could not believe that Pohiva told Ybarra that selling passports was, ‘the King’s practice’.
“Nor can I believe after hearing the accused give evidence that he told Ybarra that in 1991 the King ‘simply had the passport laws changed’, nor can I find after considering all the evidence that the accused said anything to Ybarra that properly could be paraphrased as ‘he accused the King and his nobles of financial legerdemain’.
“Whatever the complaint to Ybarra, it was clearly detailed, but the words ‘financial legerdemain’ are the journalist’s own summary of what he had understood. The complaint of the accused to Ybarra, as I understand it from the evidence, does not present to me as a complaint of sleight-of-hand, rather as a complaint of insufficient accountability,” stated the judge.
The judge found that the accused had not told the journalist that the King was a despotic dictator like Idi Amin. “There is no allegation by Ybarra in the article that the accused made any such claims to him except his purported, ‘The King is a dictator’. It is not shown to my satisfaction that the accused actually said that. But if he did then, in their context those words can only mean ‘the King is an authoritarian ruler who ignores my repeated request for accountability by himself and his Ministers’. If he said this, it appears to me to be the truth. Taking account of the evidence by the accused during the trial it appears to me not surprising that his attempts to obtain accountability in a system of government which does not provide for it, are ignored.”
The judge rejected the claim by the prosecution that when the accused said to Ybarra “The King is a dictator,” that this in its ordinary and natural meaning was the same as ‘The King is a malignant despot like Idi Amin or Adolf Hitler.’ “It is contrary to the evidence.”
The two charges that were brought by the Crown against ‘Akilisi were based on the interview that was published in the Wall Street Journal on 23 August 1994, and later reprinted in ‘Akilisi’s own newsletter, Kele‘a.
When copies of the newspaper reached Tonga, Mrs Papiloa Foliaki, a former member of parliament, and other women, organised a petition which was signed by about 425 women. The petition was presented to Parliament, asking the House to stop Pohiva from making defamatory statement to the Press. The petition was accepted by the House, and passed on to Cabinet.
Counsel for the Crown were Waalkens and Bloomfield, and for the accused were Siosifa Tu‘utafaiva and Palu Taufaeteau.