Captain Tsikata
Sir: I have acted for Captain Kojo Tsikata for about four years in his litigation with the Independent. Since the publication in
LETTERS
the Mail on Sunday of 24 August of details of an MI5 operation against her. I have also been acting for Victoria Brittain, deputy foreign editor of the Guardian.
The views of Stephen Glover (Who's backing Brittain?', 30 August) on both matters, which are quite separate, are val- ueless because they are based on factual errors and distortions.
First, Mr Glover does not seem to realise that Captain Tsikata's action against the Independent has not yet come to trial. In that situation I would ordinarily regard it as inappropriate to comment on the mer- its. However, the Independent has itself chosen to publish an incomplete (hence misleading) account of the case and Mr Glover's account is yet more misleading. It is necessary to put the record straight.
In 1992 the Independent published an article on the forthcoming general election in Ghana. The purpose was to examine the record and prospects of President Jerry Rawlings retaining power. The author cited as evidence of Rawlings's alleged unreliability on the issue of human rights the continued presence in his government of Captain Tsikata. The article said that despite a recommendation by a govern- ment-appointed inquiry ten years previous- ly that he (among others) be prosecuted in connection with the murder of three judges, Captain Tsikata had not been pros- ecuted.
The plain message to readers was that Captain Tsikata was implicated in the mur- ders and had only escaped prosecution through the protection of Rawlings. The Independent article omitted highly pertinent facts. Though the inquiry took place in public, its report was made pri- vately to the Attorney-General who alone had authority to publish it. When he did so he simultaneously (not 'subsequently', as Mr Glover says) issued a statement explaining carefully and in detail why he could not accept the recommendation to prosecute Captain Tsikata. His reasons included the fact that the evidence of Cap- tain Tsikata's involvement depended whol- ly on the accusation of a single witness also recommended for prosecution. The inquiry report and the Attorney-General's accom- panying statement were published side by side in the main Ghanaian newspapers.
Subsequently, the witness withdrew his accusation. He was himself convicted of the murder.
If the Independent had published these widely known facts there would have been no reason to complain. The article would then have been fair as well as accurate.
To accuse a man of murder is no light matter. The Independent has never at any stage attempted to justify the allegation. Instead, it has claimed privilege — a defence which, unless Captain Tsikata can prove malice (which in its legal sense includes recklessness), allows publication of a falsehood with impunity. Though the court has upheld privilege, Lord Justice Neill's comment in the Court of Appeal should be noted: 'What I have said is whol- ly without prejudice to the question whether the defence of qualified privilege can be defeated by proof of malice. The care which was exercised in relation to this publication and the reasons why, as it could be said, only one side of the story was told will no doubt require careful examination'.
On these facts, rather than the fictions and smears of Mr Glover, readers should judge the claim that the Independent 'has achieved an important vindication of the freedom of the press'.
As for Victoria Brittain, she has not been involved in the case at all. She has attended no conferences or hearings. She has expressed no views and given no instructions to lawyers. Out of friendship and for no personal gain she has allowed her bank account to be used as a conve- nient repository for funds provided by Captain Tsikata to meet his bills in this country. The implication that he could have paid my firm direct because he knew me since the 1970s is untrue. We heard of each other for the first time only through Ms Brittain's introduction in 1993.
What inspired Mr Glover to launch so vicious and baseless an attack on a highly respected fellow journalist? Doubtless he too believes in helping his friends. Is his long-standing and close association with former colleagues on the Independent a coincidence? It is he not Ms Brittain who has allowed friendship to cloud his judg- ment.
Geoffrey Bindman
Bindman & Partners, 275 Gray's Inn Road, London WC1
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