Court has thrown out Brookside Dairy Limited’s defamation case against Nyali Member of Parliament Mohamed Ali.
This is after Justice Hedwig Ong’undi upheld arguments made by Ali that the petition by Brookside is flawed and that no rights, either constitutional or human, were violated when he made remarks regarding the company.
In July, Ali asked the court to dismiss a case filed against him by Brookside Dairy Limited, a milk processing company associated with the family of President Uhuru Kenyatta after he alleged that it was exploiting and financially oppressing dairy farmers.
The firm had moved to court seeking a permanent order barring the lawmaker from advocating public hatred against it or inciting the public.
It alleged that the MP was inciting the public to cause economic and commercial harm to its business and that he violated its constitutional rights.
However, Ali filed an objection seeking dismissal of the suit on grounds that it was “incompetent”.
Through his lawyer Adrian Kamotho Njenga, the lawmaker also claimed that the intention of the court suit is to gag him as he downplayed claims that he had violated the company’s Constitutional rights.
He argued that the rights enshrined in the Constitution, under the Bill of Rights, are to be enjoyed by natural persons and not corporate entities.
“The Bill of Rights affords protections and guarantees for natural persons as individuals which protection does not extend to limited liability companies such as Brookside,” said Njenga.