Eastern Cape DA leader Athol Trollip has upped his defamation claim against Nelson Mandela Bay ANC councillor Lawrence Troon from R2-million to R5-million.
Trollip, who is also the DA’s mayoral candidate for the hotly contested Nelson Mandela Bay in the upcoming elections, initially sued Troon for R2-million in damages because, he says in court papers, Troon had deliberately set about defaming him and causing irreparable harm to his good name and reputation.
The lawsuit follows a letter from Troon, who working with renegade DA councillor Knight Mali, gave the Saturday Dispatch eight statements he said were from retired farming men and women who had worked on or close to Trollip’s former Mount Prospect farm outside Bedford.
The court papers say the allegations contained in the letters and statements by Troon were part of a malicious campaign against Trollip and were “untrue, wrongful and defamatory” of him.
The court papers said the statements would be understood by readers to mean Trollip was guilty of gross human rights abuses, racism, cruelty, exploitation, violence, land dispossession, abandonment, and of being rude and evil.
But, according to a statement from Trollip’s lawyer Brin Brody, the initial amount of R2million had been increased to R5-million after an article with similar allegations appeared in the national newspaper the City Press.
In that article it was also alleged that Trollip was a racist, mistreated his previous employees and had perpetrated human rights abuses, said Brody in the statement.
“Trollip is presently awaiting a trial date for the matter from the Registrar of the high court.”
The matter will be enrolled High Court.
Troon has previously dismissed the lawsuit as an attempt to silence him and warned he intended counter-suing.
Trollip ups defamation lawsuit claim against ANC councillor to R5-million
Trollip, who is also the DA’s mayoral candidate for the hotly contested Nelson Mandela Bay in the upcoming elections, initially sued Troon for R2-million in damages because, he says in court papers, Troon had deliberately set about defaming him and causing irreparable harm to his good name and reputation.
The lawsuit follows a letter from Troon, who working with renegade DA councillor Knight Mali, gave the Saturday Dispatch eight statements he said were from retired farming men and women who had worked on or close to Trollip’s former Mount Prospect farm outside Bedford.
The court papers say the allegations contained in the letters and statements by Troon were part of a malicious campaign against Trollip and were “untrue, wrongful and defamatory” of him.
The court papers said the statements would be understood by readers to mean Trollip was guilty of gross human rights abuses, racism, cruelty, exploitation, violence, land dispossession, abandonment, and of being rude and evil.
But, according to a statement from Trollip’s lawyer Brin Brody, the initial amount of R2million had been increased to R5-million after an article with similar allegations appeared in the national newspaper the City Press.
In that article it was also alleged that Trollip was a racist, mistreated his previous employees and had perpetrated human rights abuses, said Brody in the statement.
“Trollip is presently awaiting a trial date for the matter from the Registrar of the high court.”
The matter will be enrolled High Court.
Troon has previously dismissed the lawsuit as an attempt to silence him and warned he intended counter-suing.
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