Malaysia's Anwar loses bid for showdown with ex-PM

Malaysia's Anwar loses bid for showdown with ex-PM

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - Malaysia's de facto opposition leader, Anwar Ibrahim, lost his bid on Wednesday for a legal showdown with his old enemy, former premier Mahathir Mohamad, whom he tried to sue for defamation.
A High Court judge allowed Mahathir to strike out a defamation libel suit over a comment that Anwar was a gay.

The decision, which Anwar's lawyer called "unexpected", was a setback for the former deputy premier in his quest to get even. Mahathir sacked Anwar from government in September 1998 in a chain of events that landed him in jail.

In his suit, Anwar said that his former mentor, speaking at a September 2005 news conference in Kuala Lumpur, had described him as a gay who could be a threat to people if he became prime minister.

Mahathir's lawyer said his client had a defence of justification and qualified privilege in describing his deeds as prime minister. He had asked for the case to be dropped.

"The application is accordingly allowed," High Court judge Tengku Maimun Tuan Mat said in a verbal judgment.

The suit follows a string of unsuccessful attempts by Anwar to bring Mahathir to court since being sacked as deputy premier and finance minister and serving six years in jail on what he has said were trumped up charges.

Anwar was freed in 2004 after the courts quashed a sodomy case against him. However, a conviction for corruption bars him from holding political office until April 2008.

Malaysians watched Wednesday's hearing keenly, since the country's judiciary has sided with Anwar in previous rulings.

In August 2005, Anwar won a judgment of $1.2 million against author Khalid Jafri over a book that accused him of fathering a child out of wedlock, among other things. DNA tests showed the child was not his.

The same month he won an apology from a former police chief for beating him in custody in 1998 and giving him a black eye.

Anwar's lawyer, Sankara Nair, vowed to appeal against Wednesday's decision, calling it "most disappointing, most puzzling and unexpected".

Mahathir retired in 2003 after 22 years as premier and handed power to Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, who had replaced Anwar as number two.