Ssemwezi v Namukasa & 2 Others (Miscellaneous Cause 33 of 2022)

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

Held that where respondents lodge a caveat claiming interest in land as beneficiaries of a deceased person but fail to prove any connection between the deceased and the registered land, fail to file an ordinary suit, and fail to show cause why the caveat should not be removed after over two years, the court will exercise its inherent power under section 140(1) of the Registration of Titles Act to order removal of the caveat.

Outcome

Caveat removed from applicant's land title; application granted ex-parte after respondents failed to oppose despite effective service

Facts

The applicant is the registered proprietor of land comprised in Kyaggwe Block 336, Plot 134 at Bulere, having acquired it from the administrators of the estate of the late Fatuma Nampa. In early 2022, the applicant discovered that the respondents had lodged a caveat on his land claiming interest as beneficiaries of the late Wilson Nsubuga, the applicant's late father. The respondents alleged that the land belonged to the family of the late Wilson Nsubuga and that the applicant had registered it in his name. The applicant received the land in 2018, transferred to him in 2019 by the administrators of Fatuma Nampa's estate, after Wilson Nsubuga had already died in 2016. The land had never belonged to the estate of Wilson Nsubuga. Despite lodging the caveat, the respondents took no further action to enforce their claimed rights and did not oppose the application despite effective service.

Issues

1. Whether the respondents' caveat lodged on the applicant's land should be removed.

Orders

• Application granted.
• The Commissioner Land Registration to remove or vacate the caveat lodged by the respondents on land comprised in Kyaggwe Block 336, Plot 134, land at Bulere.
• Costs of the application awarded to the applicant.
• No damages awarded as there was no proof of loss by the applicant.

Rules and key headnotes

Legislation cited (6)

• Registration of Titles Act Cap. 230 s.140(1)
• Registration of Titles Act Cap. 230 s.142
• Registration of Titles Act Cap. 230 s.145
• Registration of Titles Act Cap. 230 s.188
• Civil Procedure Act Cap. 71 s.98
• Civil Procedure Rules SI 71-1 Order 52 rules 1 & 2

Cases cited (1)

• Ali Sidi Ngarukiye v Muyonga Andrew Mubiru (Miscellaneous Cause No. 31 of 2018)

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.

• Kampala Stocks Supermarket Limited v Orion Food Company Limited (Miscellaneous Application 2075 of 2023; Miscellaneous Application 2080 of 2023)

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