Wakilii

Eight Winx Hotel Ltd and Others v Cairo Bank Uganda Limited (Miscellaneous Application No. 1324 of 2024)

High Court · [2025] UGCOMMC 473 · 2025 Application Partly Allowed — Conditional Leave Granted AI-generated summary ↓ Download Pin to watchlist Add to matter
Jurisdiction
Uganda
Case Type
Application for unconditional leave to appear and defend a summary suit arising from mortgage foreclosure and loan recovery proceedings
Decision
Conditional leave to appear and defend granted subject to deposit of UGX 100,000,000 within fourteen days

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 court granted conditional leave to appear and defend where applicants disputed the outstanding loan amount after mortgage foreclosure. The court found the defence was not made in good faith given applicants' prior knowledge of amounts owing through multiple correspondences and restructures. Conditional leave was granted requiring deposit of UGX 100,000,000 within fourteen days as security before filing defence.

Outcome

Conditional leave to appear and defend granted subject to deposit of UGX 100,000,000 within fourteen days

Facts

On 3 September 2018 and 1 July 2019, the respondent bank extended two facilities totalling UGX 350,000,000 to the first applicant company. The second applicant mortgaged properties in Kyadondo Block 206 Plots 2382 and 2383 at Mpererwe as security. The second and third applicants executed a joint guarantee for the second facility of UGX 250,000,000. The first applicant paid UGX 143,197,000 but defaulted on the balance. The respondent issued notices of default and sale pursuant to the Mortgage Act. The facilities were restructured twice following COVID-19 pandemic. The applicants proposed settlement of UGX 250,000,000 in December 2023 which was conditionally accepted but not honoured. The mortgaged properties were sold in April 2024 and March 2025 for UGX 70,000,000 and UGX 210,000,000 respectively. The respondent filed suit claiming UGX 201,905,220 as the outstanding balance. The applicants applied for unconditional leave to defend claiming uncertainty about the true amount owing.

Issues

  1. Whether the applicants ought to be granted unconditional leave to defend HCCS No. 0729 of 2024.

Orders

  • The applicants are hereby granted conditional leave to appear and defend the suit.
  • The applicants shall deposit UGX 100,000,000 in court within fourteen (14) days of the date of this order.
  • The applicants are to file their defence within ten (10) days of making that deposit.
  • The respondent shall file a reply to the written statement of defense within 5 days of the defense.
  • The parties are to file their pre trial documents within 15 days of filing the reply to the defense.
  • The parties are to appear for the scheduling conference on 10th February 2026 at 11am.
  • The costs of this application are in the cause in case a defence is filed, but upon default they will be borne by the applicants.
  • The respondent will be entitled to judgment in default upon the applicants' failure to meet the condition attached to the leave granted to them to file a defence.

Rules and key headnotes

Summary Suits — Leave to Appear and Defend — Test for Unconditional Leave
Unconditional leave to appear and defend a summary suit will be granted where the applicant shows a good defence on the merits, or that a difficult point of law is involved, or that there is a bona fide dispute which ought to be tried, or a real dispute as to the amount claimed which requires taking an account to determine.
Summary Suits — Leave to Appear and Defend — Conditional Leave
Where the court is in doubt whether the proposed defence is being made in good faith, the court may grant conditional leave by ordering the defendant to deposit money in court before leave is granted.
Summary Suits — Leave to Appear and Defend — Burden on Applicant
In an application for leave to appear and defend, there must be sufficient disclosure by the applicant of the nature and grounds of defence and the facts upon which it is founded. The defence so disclosed must be both bona fide and good in law. The applicant cannot merely rely on conclusions in law but must set out actual evidence.

Legislation cited (6)

Cases cited (5)

  • Maluku Interglobal Trade Agency Ltd v Bank of Uganda [1985] HCB 65
  • Chwezi Properties Limited v Tulip Consultancy Limited (Civil Appeal No. 124 of 2015)
  • The Board of Governors Nebbi Town S.S.S v Jaker Food Stores Limited (Miscellaneous Civil Application No. 0062 of 2016)
  • Visare Uganda Limited v Muwema and Co. Advocates and Solicitors (Miscellaneous Application Nos. 0826 and 0827 of 2023)
  • Children of Africa v Sarick Construction Ltd (Miscellaneous Application No. 134 of 2016)

Full judgment

↓ Download PDF

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

Eight Winx Hotel Ltd and Others v Cairo Bank Uganda Limited (Miscellaneous Application No. 1324 of 2024) [2025] UGCommC 473 (24 November 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.