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The Civil Law Court has ordered the arraignment of Ecobank-Liberia, as co-defendant, in a US$700,000 libel lawsuit on Monday, December 23, 2024.
Consequently, the court ordered the parties and their legal counsels to appear on Monday, December 23, by 10 am for the trial, the notice of assignment dated Monday, December 16, in the possession of this paper noted.
The bank and some of its accomplices, Mr. Alex Williams, Deputy Director for Statistics, at Liberian Institute for Statistics and Geo Information Services (LISGIS) and a political activist Mr. Martin K. N. Kollie, recently began exploring the possibility of dismissing the accusation against them, which is said to have been denied by the court.
The case was filed by Mr. Wilmot Smith, the dismissed former deputy director general for information Coordination at the Liberia Institute of Statistics and Geo Information Services (LIGIS) against the Ecobank Liberia Limited.
Smith sought US$500,000 as general damages and US$200,000 in punitive damages, on the basis that an employee of the bank, Yussif S. Kromah (co-defendant), who released an alleged misinformation implicating the plaintiff in the illegal withdrawal of monies from the Population Census fund intended to pay enumerators.
It can be recalled that the defendant bank submitted its key documentary evidence, the LISGIS statement of leaked investigation. At the heart of the investigation, Yussif S. Kromah, the bank’s Reconciliation Officer assigned to the Card Operation Department, is accused of leaking information of LISGIS’s account details to Mr. Alex Williams, LISGIS’s deputy director for Statistics, who is not authorized by LIGIS and is a non-signatory to the account.
The document alleges that Williams manipulated the account details for his personal and selfish aims, except for the bank-client privilege. They argued, for instance, that Williams shared the account statement with the Spoon TV social media platform, one of the widely listened to talk show programs, outside of the country.
The investigation said Williams and Spoon TV used this leaked information to incriminate the plaintiff, Wilmot Smith, former Deputy Director for information and Coordination at LIGIS, for illegally withdrawing US$1.7 million from LIGIS’s account with the bank. Williams was one of the participants on a Spoon TV show where LISGIS’s account details were discussed, the investigation said.
“Williams, being disgruntled and having access to such information, was behind the Spoon discussion of the leaked account,” the investigation observed.
Smith is seeking US$500,000 in general damages and US$200,000 as punitive damages, on grounds that Kromah’s action was exhibited within the regular course of duty of the co-defendant Ecobank, citing legal doctrine. Under this law, the co-defendant Eco-bank cannot avoid responsibility for the wrongful conduct of its employee.
But the co-defendant argued that neither that nor any other of the alleged contention raised by the plaintiff had any bearing on the bank. The investigation recommended dismissal of Kromah for the sharing of confidential customer statements with Alex Williams, a former signatory to the LIGIS’s account.
Kromah, according to the investigation, confirmed that the statement of accounts he submitted to Williams was the same account displayed on the Social Media platform of Martins Kollie, a political activist.
According to the investigation, Kromah confirmed that he shared the statement with Williams, but he acted based on trust and not to bring the bank to disrepute.
The investigation established that Kromah started an engagement with Alex’ inner circle (Surroundings) prior to Williams’ appearance on the Spoon TV.
Smith’s legal team filed an Action of Damages for Wrong by Attachment argue the defendants produce the bank statements of two accounts of LISGIS to Mr. Alex Williams, an employee of LIGIS, who is one of the partner list on the Spoon Talk Show to accuse the plaintiff of withdrawing monies from the said accounts, and diverted the same to his personal benefits.
According to Cllr. Arthur Johnson, Smith’s lawyer, the bank statements were printed while his client was still in the employ of LIGIS as deputy director. “The said statements were manipulated by the defendants and the management of Spoon TV, and Mr. Stanton Witherspoon to lie that the said statements were evidence of the wrongful withdrawal,” the suit claims.
The court record claims that at the time of the libelous action, co-defendant Kromah was then employed by the co-defendant bank, in the Card Operation Department. “This act of Kromah was carried out on October 31, 2022, admitted to it in an Affidavit of attestation dated March 30,” the record alleges.
The suit further argues that co-defendant Ecobank, after investigating and being fully aware that their conduct against the plaintiff had harmed his reputation, claiming “the defendants engaged in a cosmetic approach of attempting to deal with the situation, dismissed co-defendant Kromah on January 19, 2023.”
The lawsuit claims that defendant Ecobank is responsible for the act and conduct of its employee, Kromah, because the co-defendant Eco-bank lawfully employed Kromah.” Under the doctrine of Respondent’s superior, the employer is responsible for the act and conduct of its employee, especially when the wrongful conduct was done during the course of duty of the employee and within the working hourly time of the employee in the bank facility,” the lawsuit said.
The suit also argued that the willful and calculated acts of the defendants to subject the good and untainted regulations of plaintiff, without any legal jurisdiction, is intended to expose the plaintiff to danger and harm, in the public that he had the enormous sum of money owed to the banking, thereby ignoring the frequency of crimes reported in the Liberian society. “This act of the defendants is wrongful, and the action of damages for Wrong for libel and slander will lie against the defendants.”
“The defendant’s continuous act to defame the reputation of the plaintiff on national radio stations, print media and other intellectual forums does not only damage and taint the importance of the plaintiff but has clouded and subjected the lives of the plaintiff to unwanted national and international insecurity,” the lawsuit said.
According to the suit, the plaintiff is Honorable and has ascended to public trust and integrity position.
“Through these jobs, he can indisputably engage local and international partners for business and development opportunities on behalf of his social life,” the suit noted.
It claims that as the result of the Spoon TV and Witherspoon, on radio appearances and defamatory newspaper publication attacking and bringing the hard earned reputation to the public glare and questioning by his national and international partners.
