Gopal Sri Ram JCA (delivering judgment of the court):

This is the plaintiff’s appeal against the judgment of the High Court dismissing his claim for damages for an alleged libel committed on him by the defendants. The appeal was allowed and a retrial ordered at the close of arguments. Two points were argued; one procedural, the other substantive. I will deal with each. But first here are the facts.

The plaintiff was a newspaper vendor. He distributed Chinese newspapers. One of the newspapers he distributed was the Sin Chew Jit Poh. It was published by the second defendant. The first defendant was the paper’s chief editor. The newspaper sold for 60 sen a copy and the plaintiff received a commission of 18 sen. Later, the second defendant introduced a coupon system to replace the payment of commission. Apparently it was financially less advantageous than the commission system. The plaintiff was unhappy. He asked to be compensated. The defendants published an article about the plaintiff. It was in the Chinese language. In other words, it was in a foreign language, that is to say in a language other than the language of the court. The plaintiff’s case is that the second defendant’s articl