SOUTH AFRICAN AIRWAYS LOSES APPLICATION

THE Accra Fast Track High Court has dismissed a motion filed by South African Airways seeking to stay its judgement in which the airline was ordered to pay compensation of ¢450 million to Nana Prempeh Annim-Bonsu, managing director of Starline Travel and Tours Ltd, for libel.
The court, presided over by Mr Justice P. K. Gyaesayor, said the application for stay of execution pending appeal lacked merit and was being used to deprive the plaintiff of enjoying the fruits of his judgement, which the court was not prepared to encourage.
It awarded costs of ¢3 million against the airline and ordered it to go ahead to execute the judgement as directed.
The court in February this year found South African Airways liable for libelling Nana Annim-Bonsu and ordered the airline to pay ¢450 million as compensation to him.
It awarded costs of ¢20 million against the defendant but the airline had filed a notice of appeal against the decision and also filed the instant motion.
The court also directed that an apology and a retraction of the libellous publication should be made in the Daily Graphic in a similar manner in which the publication was done by the airline.
It held that it was satisfied that Nana Annim-Bonsu, a businessman and a man of national and international repute, had suffered considerable damage as a result of the libellous publication about him.
The court stated that the plaintiff said he lost jobs from which he hoped to make profits and his application to ECOBANK to act on its behalf in the tourist business failed, while an American investor abandoned him on the prompting of the American intelligence, all because of the publication.
According to the court, the matter could have been settled out of court and that, in spite of the facilities provided by the court for an amicable settlement, the airline was recalcitrant and did put the plaintiff into additional expense to engage the services of a counsel to preserve his reputation.
The publication which gave rise to the court action was a writ in the June 7, 2005 issue of the Daily Graphic issued by the High Court for and on behalf of the South African Airways by Akyianu and Associates, a legal firm.
In that publication, Nana Annim-Bonsu, who is the Managing Director of Starline Travel and Tours Ltd, was cited as the second defendant who owed the airways $60,000.
He protested against the said publication because according to him, he did not personally owe the airline and that the cheques which were dishonoured did not belong to him personally.
According to the court, Nana Annim-Bonsu on seeing the publication caused his solicitors to write to the airline to demand a retraction of the story but that was refused by the airline.
However, it said, Akyianu and Associates, on June 16, 2005, wrote a letter to Nana Annim-Bonsu in which it was clearly stated, “We were to render an apology to your client for the said publication, which was inadvertently done and any damage caused to them thereby.”
The court said Nana Annim-Bonsu, who wanted the retraction to be done in the Daily Graphic, did not accept that apology and following that the airline repudiated the lawyer, saying that whatever he published in the Daily Graphic was not on their instruction and it could, therefore, not be held liable.
“It is worthy of note that Kwame Akyianu, at all material times, acted for and on behalf of the South African Airways and this fact has not been denied,” the court held and stated that a witness who testified for Nana Annim-Bonsu had said it was Akyianu who on the instruction of South African Airways was asked to sue Starline.
The court stated that the defence put up by the airline was no defence at all, since Kwame Akyianu wrote the publication in the normal cause of business for and on behalf of the airline.