Punch Nigeria Limited & Anor V. Dayo Adewuyi & Anor (2001)

LawGlobal-Hub Lead Judgment Report

TOM SHAIBU YAKUBU, J.C.A. 

The judgment rendered at the Lagos State High Court of Justice, holden at Ikeja Division, on 20th September, 2012, partly in favour of the 1st respondent and also partly against the appellants, prompted this appeal. By a Writ of Summons and Statement of Claim both dated 17th July, 2007 and filed on the 18th July, 2007, the 1st Respondent (As Claimant) brought an action against the Appellants and the 2nd Respondent before the trial Court for damages for libel, arrears of salary and allowance for the months of April 2006 to February 2007, plus leave allowance and an order of perpetual injunction restraining the Defendants their privies, servants and personal representatives from further publishing any form of adverse publication against the Claimant in its newspaper or any other newspaper.

The 1st Respondent was an Assistant Advert Manager in charge of the 1st Appellant’s office at Abuja, FCT, until he voluntarily resigned his appointment with the 1st Appellant on the 21st of February, 2007. While in the employment of the 1st Appellant, the 1st Respondent (Claimant)

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exercised his discretion by granting credit adverts to notable clients of the 1st Appellant like NEPA, Security and Exchange Commission among others which practice is a common practice in Newspaper and entertainment industries. Unfortunately, some of the credit adverts that the 1st Respondent authorised were not paid for on time and the Appellants expressed displeasure at the volume of credit that had been granted.

Consequent upon the displeasure of the Appellants, the 1st Respondent was instructed to recover all the monies due from the credit adverts he had authorised from the clients. The total amount credited to the 1st Respondent as credit advert totalled N7, 013,029.75 and the 1st Respondent recovered the whooping sum of N5,704,465.99 leaving a balance of N1,305,563.76.

The 1st Respondent was in constant communication with the Appellants and was still in the 1st Appellant office in June 2007 and met with Mr. A. J. Adeniran; Senior Internal Auditor, Mr. Cosmos Fasole; Legal Officer and also discussed with the Secretary to the Managing Director. Apart from being in constant touch with the 1st Appellant, the 1st Respondent had also

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exchanged correspondences with the Appellants via Memos and letters admitted and marked as Exhibits C3, C7, C10, C12-C14 and C16-C18.

The 1st Respondent was therefore surprised when his attention was drawn to the 1st Appellant’s publication of 6th, 7th and 8th July 2007 in its paper to the effect that he was wanted by the 2nd Respondent, Commissioner-of-police, F.CT. Command Abuja, for criminal breach of trust. The 1st Respondent averred that the action of the 1st Appellant and 2nd Respondent in publishing the notice was masterminded by the 2nd Appellant out of malice. That the fact that 1st Respondent had been in touch with the Appellants in all the period leading to the publication and that the 1st Respondent had not been invited by the F.CT. police command before then made the publication uncalled for and unnecessary.

It is the case of the 1st Respondent that the malicious publication which was not restricted to Nigeria but to the whole world, had cost him his freedom in the society, belittled him in the eyes of family and friends, caused him to become an object of ridicule before reasonable members of the society who looked at him with disdain

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and his reputation had been dragged in the mud.