Local weekly newspaper, The Public Eye, is to contest a default judgement against it passed by Justice Kelello Guni of the Lesotho High Court. 

The judgment awarding plaintiff Lebohang Thotanyana M1, 500,000.00 in damages for alleged defamation, was reportedly passed in the absence of the legal and management representation of the Public Eye. 

According to Editor in Chief of Public Eye, Mr. Bethuel Thai: “We were not even aware that there was a case in court which we had to answer.” Their legal representative Advocate Karabo Mohau was also not made aware of any such case against his clients.  

“We have however filed papers to indicate that we should be given a fair hearing because we do stand by what we published,” Mr. Thai maintained, speaking to MISA Lesotho. 

The defamation case flows from a story the newspaper wrote about a tiff between a company that operated the Central Bank of Lesotho’s Lehakoe Cultural and Recreation Centre and the CBL itself over a financial audit of the Centre.

16 November 2005