Wakilii

Mujuni Ruhemba v Skanska Jensen Int. (U) Ltd (Civil Suit No. 104 of 1999) (Civil Suit No. 104 of 1999)

High Court · [1999] UGHC 14 · 1999 Judgment for Defendant AI-generated summary ↓ Download Pin to watchlist Add to matter
Jurisdiction
Uganda
Case Type
First instance civil suit for breach of contract with claim for special and general damages
Decision
Claim dismissed

Observed later treatment

Cited — treatment unverified cited in 1 (treatment unverified) 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.

No adverse treatment recorded Cited 1 time with no adverse treatment recorded; not yet tested on the merits. Derived from citing cases in the Wakilii corpus — a deterministic signal, not legal advice.
Judicial journey

Appeal & case history

2 linked decisions

Follow this matter from the decision below through each appellate court.

High Court This decision
Mujuni Ruhemba v Skanska Jensen Int. (U) Ltd (Civil Suit No. 104 of 1999) (Civil Suit No. 104 of 1999) [1999] UGHC 14 (28 September 1999)
[1999] UGHC 14
Varied The decision below was changed in part.
See the court’s words
“As Bahigeine, JA and Twinomununi, JA both agree the appeal is allowed in part on the above terms.”
No later appellate decision was located in the Wakilii corpus. Linked from court records and operative language in the judgments.

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

In a breach of contract claim for unpaid sand delivery and transport costs, the court held that where parties executed a written contract specifying transport rates, a single fuelling authorization and invoicing at higher rates did not establish variation of the contract. The court-appointed auditors found the defendant had fully performed under the contract terms and paid all amounts due at the agreed rates. The claim was dismissed.

Outcome

Claim dismissed

Facts

In March 1998, the plaintiff and defendant entered into a written contract for the plaintiff to supply 2,500 tonnes of natural sand to a construction site in Mbarara at Shs 3,200 per cubic metre inclusive of VAT. The contract provided for the defendant to supply a vehicle for transportation initially, after which the plaintiff would use his own vehicles and claim Shs 8,000 per cubic metre for transport costs. The plaintiff supplied sand to the value of Shs 66,171,202 but was only paid Shs 47,411,072, leaving a claimed balance of Shs 18,760,130. The plaintiff alleged he approached the defendant to use his own transport at Shs 60,000 per truckload when the defendant failed to provide transport beyond two days, and claimed this constituted a variation of the contract. Court-appointed auditors established the defendant had paid Shs 60,139,268 in total, matching all invoices at the contracted rates, and that the dispute arose from the plaintiff charging transport at higher rates than stipulated in the written contract.

Issues

  1. Whether the disputed transport cost element as invoiced was accepted by the defendant and whether the defendant was liable to pay for it.
  2. Whether there had been a variation in the terms of the contract in particular whether transport costs were agreed upon as revised and accepted by the parties and if so whether the defendant was bound thereby to pay the plaintiff.

Orders

  • Claim dismissed.
  • No order as to costs.

Rules and key headnotes

Contract Law — Variation of Written Contract — Requirements for Proof
Where parties have executed a written contract with express stipulations, a variation of the contract terms must be proved by clear evidence and cannot be established merely by invoicing at different rates or a single isolated authorization for fuelling a delivery vehicle.
Contract Law — Breach of Contract — Proof of Non-Payment
A claim for breach of contract based on alleged non-payment fails where court-appointed auditors establish that the defendant made payments totaling the amounts invoiced at the contractually agreed rates and the plaintiff's higher claim arises from charging at rates not authorized by the written contract.
Civil Procedure — Costs — Discretion — Commercial Justice Considerations
A court may decline to award costs against a local supplier unsuccessful in a claim against an international construction company where interlocutory judgment was entered and later set aside and in the interest of commercial justice favouring the local party.

Cases citing this judgment (1)

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.

Mujuni Ruhemba v Skanska Jensen Int. (U) Ltd (Civil Suit No. 104 of 1999) (Civil Suit No. 104 of 1999) [1999] UGHC 14 (28 September 1999)
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.