Wakilii

Atim Esther Owonda v Rukia Safi Rembe (Civil Appeal No. 81 of 2022)

High Court · [2025] UGHC 965 · 2025 Appeal Struck Out AI-generated summary ↓ Download Pin to watchlist Add to matter
Jurisdiction
Uganda
Case Type
Appeal from Chief Magistrate's Court decree in summary suit for recovery of debt
Decision
Appeal struck out for being filed out of time

Observed later treatment

No later-treatment classification is recorded for this judgment.

Citator coverage is limited to judgments in the Wakilii corpus and source-matched treatment records. Absence of a signal is not an assertion that the case remains good law.

AI-generated summary. This summary was generated by AI from the full text of the judgment. It may contain errors or omissions—always read the source judgment before relying on it.

Holding

The High Court struck out the appeal for being filed out of time. The decree was entered on 14 July 2022 and the memorandum of appeal was filed on 19 August 2022, thirty-six days later, exceeding the thirty-day statutory limit under Section 79(1) of the Civil Procedure Act. The appellant neither sought an extension of time nor advanced reasons for the delay. Statutory time limits are mandatory and must be strictly complied with.

Outcome

Appeal struck out for being filed out of time

Facts

The respondent filed a summary suit in the Chief Magistrate's Court of Arua seeking to recover UGX 13,711,000 borrowed from her by the appellant. The appellant filed a miscellaneous application seeking leave to appear and defend, but the trial court dismissed the application for non-appearance and entered a decree against the appellant on 14 July 2022. The appellant filed a memorandum of appeal on 19 August 2022. The respondent raised a preliminary objection that the appeal was filed out of time, being thirty-six days after the decree instead of the statutory thirty days. The appellant did not file submissions in rejoinder to address the objection.

Issues

  1. Whether the appeal was filed within the statutory time limit prescribed under Section 79(1) of the Civil Procedure Act.

Orders

  • Appeal struck out.
  • Costs awarded to the respondent.

Rules and key headnotes

Civil Procedure — Appeals — Time Limits — Mandatory Compliance with Statutory Time Limits
Section 79(1) of the Civil Procedure Act requires an appeal to be filed within thirty days of the date of the decree or order, and this statutory time limit is mandatory and must be strictly complied with.
Civil Procedure — Appeals — Filing Out of Time — Effect of Filing Without Extension Order
An appeal filed out of time without an order of court extending the time within which to appeal is incompetent and ought to be struck out, as there exists no appeal at all.
Civil Procedure — Preliminary Objections — Nature and Determination
A preliminary objection raises a pure point of law argued on the assumption that all facts pleaded are correct, and where the objection is capable of disposing of the matter, it should be determined before proceeding to the merits of the case.
Civil Procedure — Statutes of Limitation — Strict and Inflexible Nature
Statutes of limitation are strict and inflexible enactments whose overriding purpose is that litigations shall be automatically stifled after a fixed length of time, irrespective of the merits of a particular case.

Legislation cited (3)

Cases cited (7)

  • Mukisa Biscuit Manufacturing Ltd v West End Distributors Ltd (1969) EA 697
  • Quick Enterprises Ltd Versus Kenya Airways Corporation, High Court (Kisumu) Civil Case No. 22 of 1999
  • Avtar Singh Bhamra & Another Versus Oriental Commercial Bank, Kisumu High Court Civil Case No.53 of 2004
  • Uganda Telecom Ltd v ZTE Corporation (Supreme Court Civil Appeal No. 3 of 2017)
  • Ssekazi Godfrey v Kyeyune David (Civil Appeal No. 109 of 2015)
  • Uganda Revenue Authority Vs Uganda Consolidated Properties Ltd (1977-2000) UCLR 149
  • Re-Application of Mustapha Ramathan, Civil Appeal No. 25 of 1996

Full judgment

↓ Download PDF

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

Atim Esther Owonda v Rukia Safi Rembe (Civil Appeal No. 81 of 2022) [2025] UGHC 965 (26 August 2025)
Source: this page presents Wakilii’s issue analysis and metadata for a publicly reported Ugandan judgment. Any AI-generated summary is marked as such. Judgment text is sourced from the Uganda Legal Information Institute (ulii.org). Wakilii is not affiliated with ULII.