would hurt the Government pocket. The use of the award of exemplary damages is to
induce Government to discipline its servants whose action has resulted in loss to
Government, and so to serve as a deterrent for future cases. In my opinion it is not
necessary to give extravagant sums for this purpose. I would hope that already
Government has taken action against its servants who, without any investigation, issued
this gross libel, and having issued it persisted in refusing either to apologise or to retract
it. If Government has not done so, I consider that an award of K10,000 as exemplary
damages will be sufficient to bring this consideration to mind. I see no reason to enrich
a plaintiff beyond the sum that is necessary for this purpose. I would allow the appeal to
the extent of reducing the sum of K20,000 awarded as exemplay damages to K10,000,
making a total sum of K20,000 damages.

Judgment

BARON, D.C.J.: This is an appeal from a decision of the High Court in which the
respondent, to whom I will refer hereafter as the plaintiff, recovered K10,000
compensatory damages and K20,000 exemplary damages from the defendant in
respect of libels disseminated by the radio and television services of the Government on
the 10th and 11th November, 1971. Substantially similar, although not identical, libels
were published on the 11th November, 1971, by the two daily newspapers circulating in
Zambia and, since the text of those libels is set out in the report of the case of Times
Newspapers Zambia Limited v Simon Kapwepwe [5], I do not propose to set it out
again; it is sufficient to say that the libels in question accused the plaintiff, who had for
many years been a leading political figure in the country and had held high office
including that of Vice - President, of treason and subversion, the major allegation being
that he had sent some hundreds of Zambians to places outside the country for training
in guerrilla warfare.

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