Wakilii

Lluwanga and 2 Others v Tubuley ( suing through kusiima holder of power of attorney ) (Miscellaneous Application 1786 of 2022)

High Court · [2021] UGHCLD 479 · 2021 Application Dismissed AI-generated summary ↓ Download Pin to watchlist Add to matter
Jurisdiction
Uganda
Case Type
Application for leave to adduce additional evidence on appeal arising from Chief Magistrate Court civil suit
Decision
Application for leave to adduce additional evidence dismissed with costs to the respondent

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 dismissed an application for leave to adduce additional evidence on appeal. The applicants failed to prove the evidence was unavailable at trial despite due diligence. The proposed evidence—a certificate of title, LC1 letter, medical report, and lawyer's letter—could have been obtained during trial. The evidence sought to introduce a third party's claim to ownership, which would fundamentally alter the case decided at trial. The application was also filed nearly two years after the appeal, constituting unreasonable delay.

Outcome

Application for leave to adduce additional evidence dismissed with costs to the respondent

Facts

The applicants were unsuccessful parties in Civil Suit No. 63 of 2015 before the Chief Magistrate Court of Nakawa at Luzira. They filed Civil Appeal No. 98 of 2020 and subsequently brought this application seeking leave to adduce additional evidence on appeal. The proposed additional evidence included a certificate of title registered in the name of a third party (Mr. Katinti James), an LC1 chairperson letter, a medical examination report, and a letter from lawyers dated 15 November 2021. The applicants claimed this evidence was not in their possession during trial and would assist the court in determining the dispute. The respondent opposed the application, arguing the evidence was available at trial, was not pleaded, and would introduce claims by a third party who was not party to the original suit.

Issues

  1. Whether the applicants should be granted leave to adduce additional evidence in civil appeal no.98 of 2020?
  2. Whether the intended additional evidence will ensure that justice is not only done but seen to be done?

Orders

  • Application dismissed.
  • Costs awarded to the respondent.

Rules and key headnotes

Civil Procedure — Additional Evidence on Appeal — Conditions for Admission
An appellate court may exercise its discretion to admit additional evidence only in exceptional circumstances, which include: (i) discovery of new and important matters of evidence which, after the exercise of due diligence, were not within the knowledge of or could not have been produced at the time of the suit by the party seeking to adduce the additional evidence; (ii) the evidence must be relevant to the issues; (iii) the evidence must be credible in the sense that it is capable of belief; (iv) the evidence must be such that, if given, it would probably have influence on the result of the case, although it need not be decisive; (v) the affidavit in support must have attached to it proof of evidence sought to be given; and (vi) the application must be brought without undue delay.
Evidence — Additional Evidence on Appeal — Due Diligence Requirement
A party seeking to adduce additional evidence on appeal must prove that the evidence was unavailable at trial despite the exercise of due diligence. Documentary evidence such as certificates of title, LC1 letters, medical reports, and lawyers' letters are documents that could ordinarily be accessed during trial, and failure to prove inability to access them after due diligence will result in refusal of leave to adduce such evidence.
Land & Property — Title to Land — Relative Strength of Title
In cases involving questions of ownership of land, the court is concerned only with the relative strengths of the titles proved by the rival claimants. If party A can prove a better title than party B, A is entitled to succeed notwithstanding that C may have a better title than A, if C is neither a party to the action nor a person by whose authority B is in possession or occupation of the land.
Civil Procedure — Additional Evidence on Appeal — Relevance to Grounds of Appeal
Additional evidence that introduces a matter altogether new which was never raised and does not emerge from the evidence already on record will not be admitted on appeal if it would greatly alter the whole shape of the case to make the case decided on appeal entirely different from the one decided at trial.
Civil Procedure — Additional Evidence on Appeal — Unreasonable Delay
An application for additional evidence on appeal filed nearly two years after the filing of the memorandum of appeal, without furnishing any satisfactory explanation for the delay, constitutes unreasonable delay and is a ground for dismissal of the application.

Legislation cited (4)

Cases cited (4)

  • Aluma Micheal Bayo and Others v Said Nasur Okuti (Miscellaneous Application No. 12 of 2016)
  • Makubya Enock William v Bulaim Muwanga Kibirige (Civil Appeal No. 133 of 2014)
  • Bangirana Kawoya v National Council for Higher Education (Miscellaneous Application No. 8 of 2013)
  • Ocean Estates Ltd v Pinder [1969] 2 AC 19

Full judgment

↓ Download PDF

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

Lluwanga_and_2_Others_v_Tubuley_(_suing_through_kusiima_holder_of_power_of_attorney_)_(Miscellaneous_Application_1786_of_2022)_[2021]_UGHCLD_479_(3_November_2021)
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.