Appeals Court agrees that Sir Paul Boffa was defamed

The Court of Appeal has confirmed a judgment by the First Hall of the Civil Court which had found that John A. Mizzi had libelled the memory of Sir Paul Boffa.

The appellate court heard that architect Paul Boffa had filed a libel action against Mr Mizzi accusing the latter of libelling his father, the late Sir Paul Boffa.

The First Hall of the Civil Court had found in favour of plaintiff and Mr Mizzi was ordered to pay Lm300 libel damages.

Mr Mizzi appealed to the Court of Appeal presided over by Chief Justice Vincent Degaetano, Mr Justice Anton Depasquale and Mr Justice Alberto J. Magri.

The court heard that Mr Mizzi had published an article in The Sunday Times on February 20, 1994, entitled A Yacht Marina for Xemxija?

Mr Boffa had claimed the article had alleged that Sir Paul had wanted to build on the north side of Xemxija bay. Mr Mizzi, he also pleaded, had alleged that it was for this reason that building permits had been issued in that area.

Mr Mizzi submitted, in his appeal, that the first court ought not to have proceeded to deliver judgment without having first heard the submissions of the parties.

It resulted that Mr Mizzi's claim was pending before a particular judge and had been put off for judgment. However, that judge had eventually been replaced. The judge who took over the case had delivered judgmen and Mr Mizzi argued that the judge ought to have heard the submissions made by the parties a second time.

However, the Court of Appeal dismissed this submission as unfounded, adding that Mr Mizzi had not even asked the second judge to allow him to make further observations before judgment was delivered.

Mr Mizzi had also submitted that he had written the truth and that he had no intention of libelling Sir Paul.

The Court of Appeal noted that it resulted that Mr Mizzi's submission was in the sense that he had not written anything libellous about Sir Paul.

The First Hall of the Civil Court had clearly not agreed with Mr Mizzi in the first instance and the Court of Appeal declared it was in perfect agreement with the first court.

No matter what Mr Mizzi's intention was when he had written the article the words he used were defamatory in Sir Paul Boffa's regard.

The judgment of the first court was, therefore, confirmed.