Abii Clinical & Laboratory Services Limited v Crown Health Care (U) Limited (Civil Application 177 of 2024)

Observed later treatment

No later-treatment classification is recorded for this judgment.

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Holding

The applicant sought a stay of execution of a High Court decree pending its appeal against the dismissal of an application to set aside an ex parte judgment. The respondent raised a preliminary objection that the application was incompetent because, under Rule 42(1) of the Court of Appeal Rules, it ought first to have been filed in the High Court. The single Justice held that an application for stay of execution must first be made in the High Court unless exceptional circumstances are shown, and that the applicant had adduced no evidence of any such rare or special circumstances. The preliminary objection was accordingly upheld and the application dismissed with no order as to costs.

Outcome

Application dismissed on a preliminary objection for failure to first file in the High Court; no order as to costs

Facts

The respondent sued the applicant in Civil Suit No. 789 of 2017 to recover UGX 473,099,440 for assorted items supplied in 2016. After the suit was dismissed for want of prosecution and later reinstated, the main suit proceeded ex parte when the applicant's representative sought an adjournment without evidence that counsel was indisposed. Judgment was entered for the respondent on 29 August 2022. The applicant filed Miscellaneous Application No. 1586 of 2022 to set aside the ex parte proceedings and judgment, together with High Court applications Nos. 1583 and 1584 of 2022 for interim and substantive stay of execution pending that determination. The trial Judge dismissed the set-aside application on 23 November 2023, holding the stay applications overtaken by events. The applicant appealed (Civil Appeal No. 99 of 2024) and, as the respondent commenced execution to recover the decretal sum, filed the present application in the Court of Appeal for a stay of execution.

Issues

1. Whether the application for stay of execution was competently before the Court of Appeal when it had not first been filed in the High Court as required by Rule 42(1) of the Court of Appeal Rules.
2. Whether the applicant adduced sufficient reasons to justify the grant of a stay of execution pending appeal.

Orders

• The preliminary objection by counsel for the Respondent is allowed.
• Civil Application No. 177 of 2024 is dismissed.
• No order as to costs.

Rules and key headnotes

Legislation cited (5)

• Judicature (Court of Appeal Rules) Directions SI 13-10 r.6(2)(b)
• Judicature (Court of Appeal Rules) Directions SI 13-10 r.42(1)
• Judicature (Court of Appeal Rules) Directions SI 13-10 r.2(2)
• Judicature (Court of Appeal Rules) Directions SI 13-10 r.43(1)
• Judicature (Court of Appeal Rules) Directions SI 13-10 r.44(1)

Cases cited (2)

• Theodore Ssekikubo and Others v Attorney General and Another (Constitutional Application No. 6 of 2013)
• P. K. Sengendo v Busulwa & Male Abdul [2014] 1 HCB 107

The original judgment as reported. Read the original PDF before relying on any passage.