Wakilii

Interfreight Forwarders Uganda Limited v East Africa Development Bank (Civil Appeal 33 of 1992)

Supreme Court · [1993] UGSC 50 · 1993 Appeal Allowed AI-generated summary ↓ Download Pin to watchlist Add to matter
Jurisdiction
Uganda
Case Type
Civil appeal from a High Court judgment for the plaintiff in a suit founded on breach of contract and negligence.
Decision
Appeal allowed; High Court judgment set aside and the respondent's suit dismissed with costs to the appellant.

Observed later treatment

Treatment recorded in citing cases followed in 1 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 1 case and applied in 0 cases, with no adverse treatment recorded. Citations rising — 3 citing cases on record, 3 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 allowed the appeal. It held the trial judge misdirected himself in founding liability on common-carrier strict liability, a cause of action neither pleaded nor included in the agreed issues; a party is bound by its pleadings and cannot succeed on a case it did not set up. On the only available evidence, the accident was an inevitable one occasioned by an oncoming bus on a rough hilly road, so negligence was not established. The trial judge's findings on foreign-currency damages, replacement value and interest would not have warranted interference, but the success of grounds one and two disposed of the appeal. The High Court judgment was set aside and the plaint dismissed.

Outcome

Appeal allowed; High Court judgment set aside and the respondent's suit dismissed with costs to the appellant.

Facts

The respondent bank engaged the appellant, for reward, to clear its newly purchased Volvo motor car from Mombasa and deliver it to Kampala. While the car was being transported on a carrier, the driver encountered an oncoming bus travelling at high speed on a rough, hilly road near Nairobi. He swerved off the road and braked suddenly, and three of the seven cars on the carrier, including the respondent's Volvo, were thrown off and the Volvo was damaged beyond repair. The bank sued for the price of a replacement, founding its claim on breach of contract and negligence. The High Court found the driver negligent or, alternatively, the appellant strictly liable as a common carrier, and awarded £10,275 with interest at 36% and costs. Common-carrier liability had not been pleaded nor framed among the four agreed issues; it was first raised in counsel's closing submissions. The only eyewitness evidence of the accident came from the appellant's driver.

Issues

  1. Whether the trial judge erred in basing judgment on the appellant's strict liability as a common carrier when that cause of action was neither pleaded nor among the agreed issues.
  2. Whether the evidence supported the trial judge's finding that the accident was caused by the driver's negligence rather than being an inevitable accident.
  3. Whether damages could properly be assessed at the replacement value of the car and expressed in foreign currency.
  4. Whether the award of interest at 36% and the manner of preparing the decree were justified.

Orders

  • Appeal allowed on grounds one and two.
  • Judgment of the High Court set aside.
  • Plaint of the respondent dismissed.
  • Costs of the suit and of the appeal awarded to the appellant.

Rules and key headnotes

Civil Procedure — Pleadings — Party bound by case as pleaded
A party is bound to prove the case alleged in its pleadings and covered by the issues framed, and will not be allowed to succeed on, or change to, a case inconsistent with its pleadings except by amendment.
Civil Procedure — Pleadings — Judgment on unpleaded cause of action
A trial court misdirects itself in law where it bases judgment on a cause of action (here, common-carrier strict liability) that was neither pleaded nor included among the agreed issues on which the parties contested the suit.
Tort Law — Negligence — Inevitable accident as a defence
Inevitable accident is a defence to negligence only where the defendant proves a cause whose effect could not have been avoided by reasonable care and skill; it cannot be relied on where the risk was reasonably foreseeable, and the burden of proof lies on the defendant setting it up.
Tort Law — Negligence — Appellate re-evaluation of evidence
An appellate court has jurisdiction to re-evaluate the evidence to determine whether the trial judge's conclusions should stand, but must exercise that jurisdiction with caution, interfering where there is no evidence to support a conclusion or where the trial judge has plainly gone wrong.
Damages & Quantum — Award of damages in foreign currency
Damages may be awarded and judgment expressed in a foreign currency where that currency most truly expresses the plaintiff's loss and was within the parties' contemplation, the sum being converted into local currency for enforcement.
Damages & Quantum — Measure of damages — Destruction of goods
Where goods are destroyed, the normal measure of damages is their market value at the time and place of destruction, and the plaintiff may also recover consequential expenses, including the cost of a substitute, made necessary by the tort or breach of contract.

Legislation cited (9)

Cases cited (10)

  • Plotti v Acacia Co. Ltd (1959) E.A. 248
  • Peters v Sunday Post Ltd (1958) E.A. 428
  • Jugoslavenska Oceanska Plovidba v Castle Investment Co. Inc. (1973) 3 All E.R. 498
  • Miliangos v George Frank (Textiles) Ltd (1975) 3 All E.R. 801 (HL)
  • Manners v Pearson (1898) 1 Ch. 581
  • Continental Agencies v A.C. Berril & Co. (1971) E.A. 205
  • The Despina R (1979) 1 All E.R. 421
  • Moore v D.E.R. Ltd (1971) 1 W.L.R. 1476
  • Liesbosch Dredger v S.S. Edison [1933] A.C. 449
  • Sagarmull v Galstaun (1930) A.I.R. P.C. 205

Cases citing this judgment (3)

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.

Interfreight Forwarders Uganda Limited v East Africa Development Bank (Civil Appeal 33 of 1992) [1993] UGSC 50 (6 August 1993)
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.