The magistrates’ court today ruled former Labour Prime Minister Alfred Sant to pay €1,000 in libel damages to former Nationalist minister Ninu Zammit.

Mr Zammit felt slandered by a speech made by Dr Sant and broadcast on Super One Radio in August 2007 in which Dr Sant claimed that Mr Zammit had received compensation for the expropriation of land.

Mr Zammit's land was expropriated in February 2006 by the Malta Transport Authority. The land was valued at Lm44,080 and the Lands Department had deposited this sum in court when the official notice of expropriation was published in the Government Gazette in January 2007.

This was the same procedure applied in the case of Mr Zammit's neighbours whose land had also been expropriated at the same time.

The court dismissed Dr Sant's plea that the speech constituted fair comment.