Fifi Da Queen moves to sue Vision Group for Shs1.05bn over defamation

According to the Bukedde story, which was published on September 26, Queen, real name Phiona Nabitengero, was arrested for robbery.

"The statements were on the front page, in full color and bold print accompanied by a picture of our client. Further, on page five of the aforementioned issue, you extensively published an article under the headline ebya Sipapa bikwasizza Fifi [Sipapa's case leads to Fifi's arrest] still in full color and bold," reads an intention to sue letter issued by Mwesigwa Rukutana & Co. Advocates. [Sipapa is in prison for the aforementioned robbery.]

Sipapa Pulse

"The Impugned publications carried contents that are false, malicious, and highly defamatory to our client. The headline and article are not only false but also baseless. The publications are injurious to our client's reputation in light of the inevitable interpretation attached to the same by right thinking members of society," adds the letter.

"Our client is a distinguished journalist, a businesswoman, a mother who is happily married. She is also a philanthropist and a person of high standing in society and therefore is entitled to have her reputation preserved and inviolate. As a result of your false, malicious, injurious and disparaging statements, our client's reputation which she has preserved all her life has been violated. She has received negative messages and reactions from her family, relatives, friends, in-laws, business partners, and the international community who now hold her in disrepute."

Queen wants compensation to a tune of Shs1.05 billion, citing damages to her name and legal fees.

"The contents have been interpreted by right thinking members of society to mean or imply that our client is a robber and an accomplice to a criminal who engages in surreptitious and stealthy transactions," reads the letter that was written to the Managing Director of Vision Group Don Wanyama and copied to the editor-in-chief of New Vision Printing & Publishing Co. Ltd (Vision Group) and the editor of Bukedde.

Fifi Da Queen Pulse

"This, therefore, is to demand that you offer an unequivocal apology on the front page, same size and color as that of the statements complained herein, and in addition recompense our client a sum of UGX 1,000,000,000 [one billion Uganda shillings] as compensation for your injurious statements to her reputation, and pay to us UGX50,000,000 [fifty million Uganda shillings] as legal fees so far incurred by our client."

According to the letter, if the demands are not met, in three days from the date of issuing the letter, which was September 26, they will institute civil and criminal proceedings.