Mokhtar Sidin J:

[1] At the end of the trial on 15 October 1994, I had reserved judgment for a week. I had then delivered an oral judgment in open Court on 22 October 1994 but could not make available a copy of the judgment because they were handwritten. Since then the judgment has been typed and I now make it available to the parties.

[2] The plaintiff in this case is one Tan Sri Dato Vincent Tan Chee Yioun, a businessman. He is and was at all material times the group chief executive officer of Berjaya Group Berhad which is a company listed on the Kuala Lumpur Stock Exchange. The plaintiff is also the group chief executive officer of Berjaya Industrial Berhad, Berjaya Textiles Berhad, Berjaya Leisure Berhad, Berjaya Sports Toto Berhad and Berjaya Singer Berhad. (These companies together with Berjaya Group Berhad are hereinafter referred to as "the Berjaya Group of Companies").

[3] The plaintiff claims against all the seven defendants that they had either individually or in combination among themselves and/or with persons unknown conspired by way of a systematic publication of articles vilifying the person and character of the plaintiff with the object of destroying the plaintiff's personal and commercial reputation and his business career and position as the group chief executive officer of the Berjaya Group of companies. The action by the plaintiff against the defendants is for libel, damages for tort of conspiracy, aggravated and/ or exemplary damages, an injunction to restrain the defendants and each of them by themselves, their servants or agents, or in combination or otherwise howsoever from further publication and perpetration of the said libel or any similar or like libel of or concerning the plaintiff.

[4] The first defendant is and was at all material times the publisher and editor-in-chief of the monthly magazine called the "Malaysian Industry" (hereinafter called "the said magazine"). The second defendant was a contributor and/or a staff writer of the said magazine. The third, fourth and fifth defendants are and were at all material times contributors of the said magazine. The sixth defendant is and was at all material times the publisher and/or proprietor of the said magazine. The seventh defendant was the printer of the said magazine.

[5] The particulars of the libel was published in August 1993 October 1993 and January 1994 issues of the said magazine. The particulars of the libel as pleaded in the statement of claim appeared under four separate articles in the three issues of the said magazine. The first are as pleaded in para 8 of the statement of claim which appeared in the August 1993 issue written by the second defendant under the heading "Vincent Tan's Media Forays". The offensive words are contained in the following sentences which are extracted from separate paragraphs of the article:

... The media's ability to mould public opinion whetted the appetite of corporate predators. The most visible is Tan Sri Vincent Tan...

All the excitement was related to The Sun, a daily tabloid-size newspaper which made its debut in June. What made the event particularly intriguing was that the man behind The Sun was none other than Vincent Tan...

.... Tan's decision was also governed by his relatively poor public image which stemmed from his various business manoeuvres...

.... suddenly conscious of the enormous power wielded by the local press and the apparent immunity enjoyed by business houses involved in the media industry, Vincent began an earnest search for a newspaper...

Vincent's media dealings first became public knowledge when he acquired a 20% stake in the highly successful Star newspaper. This advanced the idea that Tan was keen on getting a foothold in the local media, in line with his vague proposal to "focus on other activities...

While his stake did not give him total control, it was quite substantial and sufficient to influence the business pages at a time when he was expanding his business empire. Subsequent