Van der Merwe v Slabbert

• Jurisdiction: South Africa
• Judge: Innes CJ, Solomon JA, CG Maasdorp JA, Juta JA and Bristowe AJA
• Judgment Date: 13 December 1920
• Citation: 1921 AD 88
• Hearing Date: 10 December 1920
• Court: Appellate Division

Solomon, J.A.:

This case on the face of it appears to be a comparatively trivial one, and I should have been only too glad if we could have seen our way to leave undisturbed the decision of the court below, by which an end was put to the litigation between the parties. The appeal, however, raises a question of practice of some importance, and on principle I do not think that the judgment can be allowed to stand. The plaintiff complained that the defendant had, in the presence of one Dr. Conradie, uttered the following false, malicious and slanderous words concerning him: "Ek groet jou nie, jij is te vervloeks sleg," by which it is alleged that the defendant meant that the plaintiff was a person of disreputable character and not a fit and proper person for respectable people to associate with. To this declaration the defendant, excepted that the words complained of are not defamatory, but are mere words of meaningless abuse. This exception was allowed by the Court mainly on the ground that there were previous decisions of South, African courts in support of the exception, by which it felt that it should be guided. But

Solomon, J.A.

whether the same conclusion would have been reached if the, matter had been res nova would appear from the terms of the judgments to be somewhat doubtful.

Now dealing with the appeal first of all on principle, and without reference to any decided cases, I am bound to say that I find it very difficult to see on what ground the exception should have been allowed. For it appears to me to be essentially a case in which the Court should have had evidence of all the circumstances in which the alleged words were spoken in order to enable it to determine satisfactorily whether the words were used in a defamatory sense or not. That they are capable of bearing a defamatory meaning and of supporting the innuendo which is placed upon them does not, in my opinion, admit of any doubt. If the words "Ek groet jou nie" had stood alone, I quite agree that in themselves they would not convey any reflection upon the character of the plaintiff, but, coupled as they are with the following words "Jij is te vervloeks sleg," which give the reason why the defendant declined to have any further social relations with the plaintiff, they are quite capable of conveying to any person in whose hearing they are spoken the impression that the plaintiff was a person of bad character and was one with whom respectable people should...