Society Missionaries Of Africa (The White Fathers) v KXL and Others (Miscellaneous Cause No. 215 of 2025)

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.

Holding

The High Court dismissed an application to register a foreign judgment from the Royal Courts of Justice, London, delivered over eight years earlier. The court held that the delay was inordinate and inexcusable, the applicant was not a judgment creditor as the foreign judgment dismissed the claims against it, and there were no orders for ascertained sums capable of enforcement. Registration was declined as not just and convenient in the circumstances.

Outcome

Application for enlargement of time and registration of foreign judgment dismissed

Facts

The applicant, a religious organization, was sued in the Royal Courts of Justice, London, by three respondents (identified by pseudonyms KXL, NXR, MXD) for damages arising from alleged sexual abuse by the applicant's employee between 1995 and 2004 in Hoima and Mubende Districts, Uganda. On 2 December 2016, the London court dismissed the claims as statute-barred. During those proceedings, the applicant undertook to cooperate with investigations by the Uganda Human Rights Commission and waive certain defences if the respondents pursued that alternative remedy. In August 2025, over eight years after the judgment, the applicant applied to the High Court of Uganda to register the foreign judgment, stating it wished to trace and compensate the respondents and other potential victims. The applicant sought enlargement of time, explaining the delay by reference to difficulties tracing the pseudonymous claimants.

Issues

1. Whether the court should enlarge time to enable registration of a foreign judgment delivered more than eight years prior.
2. Whether the applicant is a judgment creditor within the meaning of Section 2(1) of the Reciprocal Enforcement of Judgment Act Cap 23.
3. Whether the foreign judgment contains orders capable of enforcement in Uganda.
4. Whether it is just and convenient to register the foreign judgment in the circumstances of the case.

Orders

• Application dismissed.
• No order as to costs.

Rules and key headnotes

Legislation cited (9)

• Foreign Judgments (Reciprocal Enforcement) Act Cap 10 s.3
• Foreign Judgments (Reciprocal Enforcement) Act Cap 10 s.4
• Foreign Judgments (Reciprocal Enforcement Rules) r.4
• Reciprocal Enforcement of Judgment Act Cap 23 s.1
• Reciprocal Enforcement of Judgment Act Cap 23 s.2
• Reciprocal Enforcement of Judgment Act Cap 23 s.2(1)
• Reciprocal Enforcement of Judgment Act Cap 23 s.2(2)
• Reciprocal Enforcement of Judgment Act Cap 23 s.2(2)(c)
• Civil Procedure Rules O.51 r.6

Cases cited (14)

• Tiberio Okeny and Another v Attorney General and 2 Others (Court of Appeal Civil Appeal No. 51 of 2001)
• Saggu v Roadmaster Cycles (U) Ltd [2002] 1 EA 258
• Bank of Uganda v Transroad Limited (Supreme Court Civil Appeal No. 3 of 1997)
• In The Matter Of An Application By Stirling Civil Engineering Limited (Miscellaneous Cause No. 308 of 2016) [2017] UGHCCD 76
• ABSA Bank Uganda Limited v Uchumi Supermarkets PLC [2021] KEHC 14
• Re Sir John Bagaire (High Court Miscellaneous Application No. 261 of 1994) [1995] KALR V 18
• Tenaga Nasional Berhad v Frazer-Nash Research Ltd and another company [2018] EWHC 2970 (QB)
• Sfeir & Co. v National Insurance Co. of New Zealand Ltd [1964] 1 Lloyd's Rep 330
• Owens Bank Ltd v Bracco [1992] 2 AC 443
• Agbara v Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Ltd [2019] EWHC 3340 (QB)
• Kuwait Airways v Iraqi Airways (Nos 4 & 5) [2002] 2 AC 883
• Re a Debtor (No 11 of 1939), Debtor v Creditor and Official Receiver [1939] 2 All ER 400
• Government of India v Taylor [1955] AC 49
• Rubin v Euro Finance [2012] UKSC 46

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