LEGAL ALERT
KEY CONSIDERATIONS FOR AMENDING A PLAINT, RE-OPENING OF A CASE AND ADDITION OF PARTIES
Parties: Canaan sites Educational Services Limited vs. Koko Investments Limited Miscellaneous Application No. 0178/2024. (Decision by Justice Susan Kanyange)
Legal Representation
Omongole & Co. Advocates, together with M.D.G. Law Advocates represented the Applicant, while Muganwa, Nanteza & Co. Advocates represented the Respondent.
Back ground
The Applicant filled HCCS No. 2285 of 2016 against the Respondent for an Order for vacant possession of Land comprised in LRV 4180 Folio 21 measuring approximately 0.541 Hectares registered in the names of the applicant. Mugaino Baker, who initially deponed a witness statement on behalf of the Respondent in the suit as an Advocate working with Uganda Land Commission, was later appointed as the Acting Commissioner Land Registration and subsequently amended the Register Book by fraudulently cancelling the Applicant’s Certificate of Title of the suit land in the course of trial after the Applicant had closed its case. Mugaino Baker then issued a title in respect of the suit land to the Respondents.
The Applicant’s filed this application seeking to add the Acting Commissioner Land Registration as a Defendant, to amend the plaint and leave to re-open its case.
COURT’S RULING
Addition of a party/defendant
For a party to be joined on the ground that their presence is necessary for the effective and complete settlement of all questions involved in the suit, it is necessary to show either that the orders sought would legally affect the interest of that person and that it is desirable to have that person joined to avoid multiplicity of suits, or that that person could not effectually set up a desired defence unless that person was joined or an order made that would bind that other person
Leave to amend a plaint
The Court will not refuse to allow an amendment simply because it introduces a new case, but there is no power to enable one distinct cause of action to be substituted for another, nor to change, by means of amendment the subject matter of the suit. The Court will refuse leave to amend where the amendment would change the action into one of a substantially different character
The Court must always be guided by the materiality of the Amendment sought, the Rule of Audi alteram partem and the genuineness of the amendment. The Court, in checking surreptitious motives, will always consider the balance of convenience between the parties or to take into account the competing rights of the parties to justice.
Leave to re-open a case.
The overriding principle is that the Court considers whether taken as a whole, the justice of the case favours the grant of leave to reopen, and any prejudice in reopening the case should be minimal. Other considerations the court should take into account include the reason why the evidence was not led timeously, the degree of materiality of the evidence, the possibility that it might have been shaped, the balance of the prejudice, the stage that the litigation had reached, the general need for finality in judicial proceedings and the appropriateness of visiting the Advocates remissness on the head of his client.
Relevance of this Ruling;
- The court will not deny an amendment simply because it introduces a new cause of action but it will do so where the amendment would change the suit into one of a substantially different character, which would more conveniently, be the subject of a new suit.
- A new cause of action which is not inconsistent with the issues raised in the original plaint will be allowed to be introduced by amendment, an amendment that seeks to introduce into the case a new cause of action totally different to that in the original plaint, or one that is manifestly contradictory to it, will not be allowed.
- Where illegalities are committed within the course of the proceeding after the Applicant has closed its case. Court has powers to grant an opportunity to the Applicant to reopen its case to speak to this new evidence that substantially affects the issue in dispute.
Editors
- Omongole Richard – Managing Partner
- Andrew Mugisha – Legal Assistant