Ramaphosa loses court bid to stop newspaper from publishing story about his personal life
Pretoria - An urgent interdict stopping Sunday Independent newspaper from publishing claims about Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa's personal life has been struck from the roll in the South Gauteng High Court on Saturday evening.
Judge Bashier Vally, in his judgment said that Ramaphosa had not placed sufficient information before the court to show that the matter was urgent and subsequently struck it from the roll.
Ramaphosa the South Gauteng High Court on Saturday evening in a bid to stop the newspaper from publishing a story which makes claims about his personal life emanating from alleged private emails.
Ramaphosa on Saturday described claims made about his personal life as an “episode [that] extends far beyond an attempt at political smear”.
“It represents an escalation of a dirty war against those who are working to restore the values, principles and integrity of the African National Congress and society,” the presidential hopeful said in response to a message doing the rounds on social media purporting to be correspondence directed to him from a Sunday newspaper.
A WhatsApp message has been doing the rounds, purporting to be correspondence directed to Ramaphosa from the Sunday Independent.
“There is no doubt that these messages have been circulated as part of a deliberate campaign to smear the person of the deputy president. They are a transparent attempt to distort personal email correspondence that could only have been obtained through criminal means,” Ramaphosa’s spokesperson Tyrone Seale said.
Sunday Independent Editor Steven Motale told News24 that the outcome of the court application was a victory for media freedom.
Motale said that Ramaphosa had contributed immensely to the constitution and that he should know better than to claim privacy when he holds public office and he is running for the top position in government.
"He portrays himself as a paragon of moral value, he should know better," said Motale.
Seale said they would not be commenting on the court judgment.
