Lottery. Photo: Ashraf Hendricks / GroundUp
Judge Hennie de Vos in the High Court in Pretoria has struck from the roll an urgent application to remove articles from the GroundUp, Citizen and Daily Dispatch websites.
In November, GroundUp published an article describing the dealings between Lesley Ramulifho, a Pretoria-based attorney, and the National Lotteries Commission. We published two follow-up articles in December and March. The three articles were republished in various outlets, including Daily Dispatch and The Citizen.
On 4 April Ramulifho and his firm, Ramulifho Incorporated Attorneys, served papers on GroundUp, Daily Dispatch and The Citizen, as well as journalist Raymond Joseph, the first author on the stories. They asked the court to urgently order the publications to remove all articles from their websites that make any reference to Ramulifho. They also asked the court to order the publications to publish a retraction, and not to publish any further articles about Ramulifho, pending further litigation.
All three publications opposed the application. The case was heard on Tuesday and Wednesday. De Vos decided the application was not urgent, and struck it from the roll on Wednesday. He also awarded costs against Ramulifho.
Ramulifho can still ask the court to hear his application, but not as a matter of urgency.
Here are the articles that were the subject of Ramulifho’s application:
Republished from GroundUp
For more news your way, download The Citizen’s app for iOS and Android.
Download our app and read this and other great stories on the move. Available for Android and iOS.
