The Constitutional Court will on Thursday hear an appeal by The Citizen newspaper against a defamation finding in favour of former Ekurhuleni metro police chief Robert McBride.

Earlier this year, the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) upheld a high court ruling that the newspaper defamed McBride by referring to him as a murderer in a series of articles and editorials written in 2003, which questioned his appointment.

The Citizen had pleaded that the comment was in the public interest, fair and based on true facts.

However, the SCA found that McBride could no longer be branded a criminal and murderer for the bombing of the Magoo's Bar/Why Not Restaurant in Durban in 1986, in which three women died, because he had been granted amnesty by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC).

The SCA held that the Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act stated that amnesty expunged the conviction and sentence from all official records and also that "the conviction shall for all purposes ... be deemed not to have taken place".

The Citizen was ordered to pay damages of R150 000.

The SCA overturned a ruling on McBride's complaint about reference in the articles to his arrest and detention in Mozambique in 1998 on suspicion of gun-running and did away with the R50 000 damages award for this.

On Thursday, the Constitutional Court is expected to hear argument by The Citizen that the TRC Act does not deem crimes granted amnesty never to have been committed, that the purpose of the TRC Act was truth-telling, and that the SCA's interpretation curtails freedom of expression and prevents victims and the public from describing the perpetrators of heinous crimes as criminals and murderers.

Five friends of the court have been admitted.