The sole MEP candidate of the Liberal Democratic Alliance, John Zammit, was yesterday acquitted of criminally libelling a Labour MP after a judge ruled that the private life of a public person was open to scrutiny.

Mr Zammit was fined €1,000 last year and also ordered not to molest Joe Mizzi for a year against a guarantee of €2,300 following an online article in March 2009, which criticised a planning permission obtained by the parliamentarian to increase the size of his house.

Mr Zammit appealed the sentence insisting on his right to freedom of speech and the freedom of the press, citing a number of European Court judgements to back his claims that a public person should expect more criticism than a private person.

In a series of articles, Mr Zammit had questioned how Mr Mizzi, an MP whose cousin was the mayor of Kalkara, could have received planning permission to build extra floors on his government-owned house when others in the same area were denied such permits. He also questioned how the MP tended a large number of plants that were in a public space near his house.

Mr Zammit argued that the situation appeared to amount to abuse of power by the MP who, by hook or by crook, managed to obtain a permission to build when other residents had failed.

In the appeal judgement, Mr Justice Michael Mallia said it was a fact that Mr Mizzi’s house was much larger than others in the same housing estate, whether in height, in length or width. Furthermore, it was also a fact that Mr Mizzi was the cousin of Michael Cohen, the mayor of Kalkara, where the house is situated.

These facts were open to criticism precisely because Mr Mizzi was a person in the public eye and the facts were not something personal but public.

Mr Justice Mallia said that the private life of a public person could be commented upon and criticised when that private life directly impinged on the person’s public life. When someone had a house in a government residential area that was bigger than anyone else’s it was no longer a private matter and everyone had the right to question how that person managed to acquire it.

Mr Zammit was also free to refer to the relationship Mr Mizzi had with his cousin, the mayor.

In his submissions, the Attorney General argued that the case was not limited to the house belonging to Mr Mizzi but, rather, consisted of a systematic attack by Mr Zammit who attempted “character assassination”.