Businessman Richard Young, who made a failed bid for a contract in the arms deal, is suing Yunis Shaikh, brother of former chief of acquisitions Shamim "Chippy" Shaikh, for R250 000 for defamation.

In his response to the claim, Shaikh, a lawyer at the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration in Johannesburg, apologised to Young and conceded that his comments in an interview on e.tv's Third Degree in November 2001 were "not correct, proper or fair".

Rashid Vahed, SC, appearing for Shaikh, argued in the Cape High Court yesterday that the injury to Young's reputation could have been better addressed with an apology and retraction than a damages claim.

In papers before the court, Young, head of C2I2, claims Shaikh's remarks were broadcast to a national audience of up to 600 000 people and were understood by viewers to mean he was a liar, dishonourable and untrustworthy, guilty of disgraceful conduct, and defamed people and misused the media to achieve his ends.

In the programme, shown in court before Justice Hennie Nel yesterday, Shaikh told Third Degree journalist Deborah Patta that Young had embarked on "a campaign of sleaze and slander" through the media after he had been removed as a preferred contractor to provide the information management system for the corvettes to be built for the navy.

The information system is the ship's brains, linking weapons, communications and vessel control systems.

Among the statements that Shaikh made about Young in the interview were:

"He put forward a tender saying he had a demonstrator model of a product that has never been tested under battle conditions, for which product he refused to stand guarantee ...

"So he wants to offer a product to the military that's worth R30 million. He refuses to stand guarantee for that product when called upon to do so."

"When the cabinet refuses to carry the cost of that guarantee, Richard Young, in a fit of pique, then begins a programme of sleaze and slander."

"Young has embarked on a campaign of sleaze and slander, using the press - the gullible press, if I may add."

Shaikh said the media had kept the issue "alive" unfairly.

They had accepted "a tissue of lies" from Young while they "denigrated, humiliated and caricatured the Shaikh family to be a bunch of rogues", he said.

"No, our victimisation is that we are now subjected to mob justice, the mob justice, Patta, that you and members of the Fifth Column, by means of sleaze and slander and a tissue of lies have allowed and whipped up the public into a frenzy that now they bay for the blood of anybody."

Judgment has been reserved.

With acknowledgements to Fatima Schroeder and the Cape Times.