Emmejje and Another v Asegoit (Civil Application 24 of 2024)

Observed later treatment

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.

Holding

The single Justice dismissed the application for a temporary stay of execution pending appeal. Applying the conditions restated in Ssekikubo v Attorney General, the Court held that the applicants failed to establish a prima facie case or likelihood of success: they neither attached a memorandum of appeal nor the impugned High Court decision, so the Court could not assess the merits, following Osman Kassim v Century Bottling. A bare assertion that an appeal has high chances of success is insufficient. The applicants also failed to demonstrate any irreparable damage. As the first two conditions were unmet, the balance of convenience did not arise, and the application was dismissed with costs.

Outcome

Application for temporary stay of execution dismissed with costs to the Respondent

Facts

The applicants and the respondent are co-administrators of the estate of the late Okacuga Martin, a polygamous man with three wives who each settled with their children in separate villages. The respondent, a step-mother to the applicants, lived with her children at Kasoli East Village. In 2016 the Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) project required that land, displacing the respondent's family; her husband died in October 2016 before compensation was paid. The SGR later paid compensation of UGX 10,300,000 (April 2021) and UGX 227,642,669 (June 2022) into the estate account. The applicants demanded that the compensation be split equally among all three families, including those unaffected by the project. The respondent filed High Court Miscellaneous Cause No. 279 of 2022 seeking a declaration that she and her children were solely entitled to the compensation, which the High Court determined in her favour. The applicants appealed (Civil Appeal No. 1353 of 2023) and sought a stay of execution to preserve the position pending the appeal.

Issues

1. Whether the applicants satisfied the conditions for the grant of a temporary stay of execution pending appeal.
2. Whether the applicants established a prima facie case of a right of appeal or a likelihood of success on appeal.
3. Whether the applicants would suffer substantial or irreparable loss if the stay were not granted.

Orders

• The application is dismissed.
• Costs of the application awarded to the Respondent.

Rules and key headnotes

Legislation cited (2)

• Judicature (Court of Appeal Rules) Directions SI 13-10 Rule 6(2)(b)
• Judicature (Court of Appeal Rules) Directions SI 13-10 Rule 43

Cases cited (5)

• Lawrence Musitwa Kyazze v Eunice Busingye (Supreme Court Civil Appeal No. 18 of 1990)
• Hon. Theodore Ssekikubo and Others v Attorney General and Another (Constitutional Application No. 6 of 2013)
• Gashumba Maniraguha v Sam Nkudiye (Supreme Court Civil Application No. 24 of 2015)
• Gapco Uganda Ltd v Kaweesa and Another (Miscellaneous Application No. 259 of 2013)
• Osman Kassim v Century Bottling Company Ltd (Civil Appeal No. 34 of 2019)

Cases citing this judgment (2)

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.

• Emmejje and Another v Asegoit (Civil Application 35 of 2024)
• Emmejje & Another v Asegoit (Civil Application 35 of 2024)

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