Kuwait Court of Cassation principle number 94

Summary: - The freedom of those responsible for television and radio broadcasting stations and equipment to present and transmit audiovisual material of various kinds reaching the public or particular sections thereof. Its limitations. It must not extend to infringing persons’ dignity, private lives or religious beliefs. Violation thereof. Consequence: the person responsible must be held accountable as the perpetrator of insult, defamation or humiliation, as the case may be, and must be held liable to compensate for the harm suffered by others. Rule: The effect of Articles Eleven and Thirteen of Law No. 61 of 2007 concerning Audiovisual Media indicates that the freedom of those responsible for television and radio broadcasting stations and equipment to present and transmit audiovisual material of various kinds reaching the public or particular sections thereof is restricted so that it does not extend to infringing persons’ dignity, private lives or religious beliefs. Otherwise, the person responsible must be held accountable as the perpetrator of insult, defamation or humiliation, as the case may be, and must also be held liable to compensate for the harm suffered by others. It is established that ascertaining the true nature of words of insult, defamation or humiliation depends on the trial court’s satisfaction in its understanding of the facts of the case, without review by the Court of Cassation so long as it has not erred in applying the law. That being so, and whereas the challenged judgment, after considering the content of the discussion in the programme broadcast by the television channel managed by the second appellant in Civil Appeal 897 of 2014, concluded that the remaining appellants in the two appeals—the programme presenters—introduced the respondent’s name into the discussion without any justification requiring it, and the three of them took turns sarcastically commenting on the economic entities he owns and with which he and his family are associated, attributed to him that he buys journalists with his money, and sarcastically invited him to provide them with work at the channel he owns for fantastic salaries, stating that he would not object provided that they did not criticise personalities whom they identified by name as being associated with him. They also attributed to him recording the account of a female figure who had lived through the events of 1938 and striving desperately with another woman who possessed facts about the Al-Rumaila area, which had been a haven for corruption and brothels. The judgment concluded that what was broadcast through the television channel in this manner was with its manager’s approval and involved disparagement, belittlement and humiliation of the respondent’s person and infringed his dignity beyond permissible criticism, thereby establishing the element of fault on the part of the appellants in the two appeals and their liability to compensate him for the harm he suffered as a result. This was a tenable inference by the judgment, with an established basis in the papers and sufficient to support its ruling. The complaint against it on this ground is therefore no more than an argument concerning matters independently assessed by the trial court, which may not be raised before the Court of Cassation, and is consequently inadmissible.