A high school teacher, Dorothy Oluoch, has been fined KSh 2.5 million by a magistrate’s court in Siaya over a defamatory Facebook post targeting a politician. The post, made in 2021, was found to have damaged the reputation of Peter Odhiambo Owiti, who had contested unsuccessfully for the North Gem MCA seat during that year’s general election.
In his suit filed on August 23, 2021, Owiti accused Ms. Oluoch of publishing statements on her Facebook account that questioned his integrity and painted him as untrustworthy. He argued that the post, shared during the campaign period, portrayed him as a conman and risked undermining public confidence in his leadership, possibly affecting the outcome of the election.
Through his lawyers, the politician asked the court to issue three orders: a permanent injunction restraining Ms. Oluoch and her associates from posting any further defamatory statements, a public apology published across all her social media platforms, and compensation in general and exemplary damages, along with the full cost of the case.
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In her defense, Ms. Oluoch claimed that the information she shared was truthful and made in the public interest. She alleged that Mr. Owiti had transferred money from her mother’s M-PESA account without consent. However, the court found that she had not reported the incident to the police nor presented any evidence to substantiate the claims in court. As such, her defense was dismissed.
While delivering the judgment, Siaya Magistrate Jacob Mkala ruled in favor of the politician, awarding him KSh 2 million in general damages and an additional KSh 500,000 in exemplary damages. The court also ordered Ms. Oluoch to delete all defamatory posts from her social media platforms and issued a permanent injunction preventing any further defamation of the plaintiff.
The ruling underscores the growing weight of online defamation cases in Kenya’s legal landscape, especially as social media continues to influence public perception and political discourse.
By Mercy Kokwon
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