Wakilii

Beatrice Kobusingye v Fiona Nyakana and Anor (Civil Appeal 5 of 2004)

Supreme Court · [2005] UGSC 3 · 2005 Appeal Struck Out AI-generated summary ↓ Download Pin to watchlist Add to matter
Jurisdiction
Uganda
Case Type
Third appeal to the Supreme Court from an interlocutory ruling of the Court of Appeal overruling an objection to the competence of two grounds of a second appeal.
Decision
Appeal struck out as incompetent; no order as to costs.

Observed later treatment

Treatment recorded in citing cases followed in 2 Sequitur — Uganda’s citator · Derived from citing cases in the Wakilii corpus — not an assertion that this case is good law.

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.

Good law Followed in 2 cases and applied in 0 cases, with no adverse treatment recorded. Citations rising — 17 citing cases on record, 8 in the most recent three data years. Derived from citing cases in the Wakilii corpus — a deterministic signal, not legal advice.

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 Supreme Court held the appeal incompetent: under s.6(2) of the Judicature Act no appeal lies to it from an interlocutory order of the Court of Appeal that is incidental to, and not the final determination of, an appeal. The Court of Appeal had not yet decided the appeal, so its certificate granting leave was wrongly given, and the appeal was struck out. Exercising its duty to correct an illegality once drawn to its attention, the Court nonetheless held that the Civil Procedure Act, including its old sections 74 and 75 (now 72 and 74), does apply to the Court of Appeal, and that the Court of Appeal had erred in holding otherwise.

Outcome

Appeal struck out as incompetent; no order as to costs.

Facts

The two respondents sued the appellant in the Chief Magistrate's Court, Fort Portal, claiming damages for malicious prosecution and false imprisonment. A Magistrate Grade I dismissed the suit as improperly brought before the court. The respondents' appeal to the High Court failed. They then lodged a second appeal to the Court of Appeal on four grounds. The appellant, as respondent in that court, objected to two of the grounds, arguing that since the trial magistrate and the High Court had made concurrent findings of no malice, the Court of Appeal as a second appellate court lacked jurisdiction to reopen the matter, and that old sections 74 and 75 of the Civil Procedure Act restricted it. The Court of Appeal overruled the objection, holding that section 11 (old) of the Judicature Act gave it wide powers and that old sections 74 and 75 of the Civil Procedure Act did not apply to it. The appellant obtained leave and appealed that interlocutory ruling to the Supreme Court.

Issues

  1. Whether an appeal lies to the Supreme Court from an interlocutory order of the Court of Appeal that is incidental to, but not the final determination of, an appeal.
  2. Whether the old sections 74 and 75 (now sections 72 and 74) of the Civil Procedure Act apply to the Court of Appeal.
  3. Whether the Court should correct an illegality drawn to its attention notwithstanding that the appeal is incompetent.

Orders

  • Appeal struck out as incompetent.
  • No order as to costs.

Rules and key headnotes

Civil Procedure — Appeals — Competence — Interlocutory Orders of the Court of Appeal
No right of appeal lies to the Supreme Court from an interlocutory order of the Court of Appeal that is incidental to an appeal but does not result from the final determination of the appeal itself; a certificate granting leave to lodge such an appeal is improperly given and the appeal is incompetent.
Civil Procedure — Appellate Jurisdiction — Applicability of the Civil Procedure Act to the Court of Appeal
The Civil Procedure Act, and in particular its old sections 74 and 75 (now sections 72 and 74), applies to the Court of Appeal; nothing in section 1 of the Act prohibits its application to procedure in the Court of Appeal or the Supreme Court, and a decision holding that the Act or those sections do not apply to the Court of Appeal is bad law.
Statutory Interpretation — Judicature Act and Civil Procedure Act — Source of Appellate Jurisdiction
Section 11 (old, now section 10) of the Judicature Act confers appellate jurisdiction on the Court of Appeal in general terms, while the detailed classes of civil appeals are set out in the Civil Procedure Act; rules of procedure such as rule 31(2) of the Court of Appeal Rules do not themselves create jurisdiction but merely regulate the exercise of jurisdiction already conferred.
Civil Procedure — Illegality — Duty of Court to Correct
Where an illegality is brought to the attention of the court, the court is bound to correct it, even where the appeal in which it arises is itself incompetent.

Legislation cited (19)

Cases cited (4)

  • Uganda National Examinations Board v Mpora General Contractors (Civil Application No. 19 of 2004)
  • Mukula International v Cardinal Nsubuga (1982) HCB 11
  • Ephrain Ongom Odongo v Francis Renega Bonge (Civil Appeal No. 10 of 1987)
  • Francis Sembuya v Allports Services (U) Ltd (Civil Appeal No. 6 of 1995)

Cases citing this judgment (17)

How later Ugandan judgments in the Wakilii corpus have cited this case. Treatment labels come from Sequitur — Uganda’s citator — each backed by a verbatim span from the citing judgment, and are not an assertion that this case is, or is not, good law.

Full judgment

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

Beatrice Kobusingye v Fiona Nyakana and Anor (Civil Appeal 5 of 2004) [2005] UGSC 3 (22 February 2005)
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.