Commercial Law Index

The court considered the admissibility of a land agreement, the conditions to prove for the existence of a customary arbitration and the court 's discretion in awarding damages.

The court held that for a document to be admissible it must be relevant to the facts in issue and fulfil the prescribed conditions in law. According to s 108 (1) of the Evidence Act Cap 112, courts are permitted to form their opinion about signatures.  The court also held that the conditions for an existence of a customary arbitration are : (a)  voluntary submission to arbitration, (b) agreement of binding decision of the arbitration, (c) arbitration was per custom, (d) published award and (d) acceptance of the award. The court held that general damages are the judge's discretion.

The court found that the trial judge was correct in admitting the document as evidence and establishing equitable interest in the land dispute and that the plaintiff had proved better title to the land. The court also found that the parties were aware fully aware of the land in dispute. The court further found that the evidence on record did not meet the condition for an existence of a customary arbitration. Relief cannot be claimed by a deceased person. Also, found that the pleading of the parties and evidence adduced were in tandem with the conclusion made by the trial judge according to s 149 of the Evidence Act.

The court accordingly dismissed the appeal and respondents awarded costs.
 

This case concerned the difference between a claim for special and general damages. The court found that damages is a method by which courts offer monetary reparation to persons whose rights in contract law have been violated, as a means to restore them to the situation in which they would have been but for the violation. Thus, damages play an invaluable role in the capacity of courts to give solatium (compensation or consolation) to the parties. Therefore, the claim for damages will be premised on the cause or causes of the violation and the consequences attached. The court found that in order to succeed with a claim for damages the plaintiff must satisfy the court with credible proof that there has been a breach, giving rise to the cause of action.

The plaintiff claimed loss of labour, unrefunded deposits and administrative expenses in its claim for damages, constituting special damages. While general damages are presumed by the law from the invasion of a right, special damages refer to the particular damage suffered by a party beyond that presumed by law from the mere fact of an invasion of a right and must be proved strictly by evidence. Thus, if a plaintiff does not specifically plead his loss and prove it, he cannot succeed in a claim for special damages.

The appeal succeeds in part.

The plaintiff/appellant was aggrieved the Court of Appeal’s reduction of a damages award made by the High Court pursuant to its compensation claim for wrongful termination of employment. The Court of Appeal held that the award was excessive on several grounds – a finding that formed the basis of this appeal.

The Supreme Court emphasised that the court’s discretion to award damages must be done so judiciously. That the trial judge’s order was influenced by factors such as the size of the plaintiff’s family, the defendant/respondent’s instituting of a failed prosecution and delays in court proceedings – which the appellant sought in vain to attribute to the respondent –  rendered the extent of the award ill-considered. Moreover, the High Court neglected to provide a terminating point for the computation of the appellant’s salary and allowances, which translated to excessiveness. Guided by the case law, the court fashioned a reasonable award which more closely considered the parties’ situation.

Deviating from the Court of Appeal’s order, the Supreme Court found it was unfair that payment of the appellant’s other employment entitlements was limited to its provident fund. It therefore altered this portion of the below court’s order to reflect that the appellant be paid all earnings, entitlements or remuneration which it was owed for the period of fifteen months after the wrongful dismissal. It similarly reversed the Court of Appeal’s substitution of the High Court’s award of three-months’ salary to one-month’s salary, finding that this reduction was unfair in the absence of any reasoning therefor.

The appeal was upheld in part.

The matter involved a dispute as to whether there was a contract and in effect breach of contract.

The main issue before the court was whether there was a contract for sale of goods and in consequence whether there was breach. Citing trite law that there is no contract if there is no agreement on the essential terms of contract, the court established that the alleged contract did not mention the amounts allegedly guaranteed whilst the demand for payment itself was not linked to the telephone transactions. The court considered the definition of a proforma invoice and concluded the alleged contract was part of negotiations and was therefore an offer to treat. As there was no indication of agreement on the essential terms, there was therefore no contract and consequently no breach of contract.

In obiter, the court also dealt with the question whether special damages were rightfully awarded by the court a quo. Acknowledging special damages as damage in fact caused by wrong and the claim requirements for specificity of pleading and proof, the court concluded that the award of special damages was inconsistent as liability could not be imported on a non-existent contract.

The court thus concluded in favor of the appellant and allowed the appeal.
 

This case involved an allegation that the defendant had not paid fully for services stipulated within an advertising agreement with the plaintiff. This case illustrates the importance interpreting the terms within a contract in line with what the parties to that contract had agreed.

The court held that the court’s duty is to interpret clause 4 of the contract in order to determine what the parties had agreed to. The court had regard to statements of English authority on the interpretation of commercial contracts. In particular, 
 that ‘[t]here must be ascribed to the words a meaning that would make good commercial sense … and not some meaning imposed … that no businessman in his right senses would be willing to incur.’ 

The court was satisfied that the according to the terms of the contract, the plaintiff as the ‘landlord’ had provided the defendant as the ‘advertiser’ space for advertising, and undertaken the contested printing activities for its benefit. The court held that the only sensible interpretation of the contract was that the cost of this printing was to be borne by the defendant because the alternative view would lead to a conclusion that ‘flouts common business sense’. 

The court ruled that the defendant was supposed to pay the 3.5 million Ugandan shillings for the printing.
 

The plaintiff registered its business name as ‘Standard Signs Uganda’, and the defendant incorporated as ‘Shandard Signs (Uganda) Limited’. The court considered whether the defendant had infringed on the plaintiff's trademark, was guilty of passing off and the applicable remedies.

The court held that s 6(1) of the Trade Mark Act grants a registered proprietor exclusive rights of use. The legal basis of passing off is that it is wrong for the defendant to represent for trading purposes that his goods are that of the plaintiff. Also, the plaintiff needs to prove that its business had acquired goodwill. If the defendant is passing off goods, the assumption is that the plaintiff is prevented from selling more goods and damages are a reasonable sum of actual loss.

The court found that the difference was only in the letters ‘t’ and ‘h’; in any event the pronunciation of ‘Standard’/’Shandard’ are similar. The other words in the business names are similar or identical, and the logos are also similar. On this basis, the court concluded that the concurrent use of the two registered trade names and logos are likely to confuse; accordingly they infringe on the plaintiff's trademark. Consequently, the defendant's registration of the name was irregular.

The court concluded that the plaintiff had shown that it had acquired goodwill, therefore, misrepresentation was made out. In that regard, had suffered damages because of erroneous belief endangered by the second defendant's misrepresentation.

The court observed that there was no case against the first defendant under the principle of corporate personality.

The court upheld the plaintiff's complaints and awarded damages, a permanent injunction and costs.

The plaintiff sued the defendant for breach of contract following its failure to pay in full – inclusive of VAT and penalties accruing from delayed payment – for construction services rendered. Two clear issues arose: whether the plaintiff was entitled to the sum claim and what remedies were available to the litigants. The contract provided for specific procedures in the event of disputes between its signatories. The plaintiff’s grievances with the project manager’s final certificate (which confirmed the amount owing by the defendant) ought to have been aired via these channels, so the defendant could be alerted thereto.

Because timeous and effective payment was based on certificates, the court found that the defendant could not be held liable for non-payment exceeding the certified amount. The court accordingly reduced the sum claim. Because the defendant had hampered the plaintiff’s commercial endeavours through its breach, it stood liable for general damages. The plaintiff provided no elucidation on the quantum thereof, and so its determination fell to the court’s discretion.

The plaintiff brought an action for breach of contract, for the defendant to pay the balance of the money paid by the plaintiff to the defendant in terms of their contract, and for interest on the amount.

The sourt held that on the evidence the defendant failed to deliver all the sugar within the seven weeks. The defendants did not adduce any evidence to the contrary, and the plaintiff was entitled to refund of the money paid for the sugar. The issue was whether general damages ought to be awarded in addition to interest on the outstanding amount.

Section 50 of the Sale of Goods Act provided that the remedy for wrongful non-delivery was damages. The measure was the estimated loss directly and naturally resulting in the ordinary course of events from the seller’s breach of contract. General damages will usually be awarded to place the plaintiff in as close a position as possible they would have been had the injury not occurred. Where interest is awarded for deprivation of monies to be paid, then general damages will not be awarded in addition to interest. The award of interest would place the plaintiff in its original position. 

The court held that the plaintiff did not adduce evidence of what loss was suffered to warrant an award of general damages. Interest was therefore awarded in lieu of general damages. 
 

The plaintiff was a registered owner of "Feathers" sanitary pads and claimed that the defendant imported "Featlhers" sanitary pads to be sold in Uganda. The court considered whether the plaintiff had exclusive use of a trademark which was infringed by importation and sale of a product.

The court held that s 36 of the Trade Marks Act grants exclusive use of a mark, which is infringed if a person who is not the owner of that mark uses it and causes confusion to average consumers. Civil proceedings may be instituted in terms of s 79(1). According to ss 79(3) and (4), the grant of an injunction does not affect a claim of damages, direct loss of sales and consequent loss of profits as well as the depreciation of the goodwill. Section 81(1) provides that one available form of relief is an account of profits to the plaintiff.

The court found that the plaintiff had exclusive use of the trademark. Despite the minor differences the goods were the same visually, conceptually, phonetically and belonged to the same class of goods. Therefore, concluded that the goods would likely confuse reasonable consumers. The defendants were guilty of infringement of the trademark by selling and importation of the sanitary pads. The plaintiff did not deal with the actual loss of sales, and no evidence was adduced to show that the counterfeit goods were circulating in Uganda.

The plaintiff's complaints were upheld. The court granted costs, ordered the destruction of the impounded goods, permanent injunction and general damages.

In this case the plaintiff claimed for special and general damages against the defendant for fraud and conversion of the plaintiff’s petroleum products. The case deals with fraud, where the party that benefited was not a bona fide purchaser of the products in this case. The court considered whether the defendant had good title for the products sold to him by the third party. Whether the defendant had a claim against the third party and whether there were remedies available to the parties.

In dealing with the first issue the court considered whether the defendant had acquired a better title than the mysterious seller had because the mysterious seller did not have any title to the good. The court applied the general rule in the latin maxim nemo dat quod non habet which was reflected in section 22 (1) of the Sale of Goods Act. The court found that the mysterious seller had no title to pass to the defendant and thus the defendant never acquired good title to the property. Therefore, the defendant was liable to make good any loss suffered by the plaintiff as a result of the conversion of the plaintiff’s goods.

In considering the second issue, the court found that the defendant had proved the transaction it had made with the third party and was therefore indemnified against the third party.

In considering the remedies available to the parties, the court held that general damages are compensatory to fulfil the principle of restitution in integrum which aims at restoring the plaintiff as nearly as possible to the position he or she would have been had the injury not occurred.

Therefore, the court upheld the plaintiff’s claim with costs.
The court also held that for the indemnity suit against the third party, the third party was to settle all liabilities ordered against the defendant less the amount against the defendant.
 

The matter involved a dispute over the defendants’ refusal to release a certificate of title pursuant to an agreement to do so. 

The first issue was whether the defendant was justified in not releasing the certificate of title belonging to the plaintiffs. The court observed that the defendant’s conduct in refusing to release the title created an impression of premeditated non-performance with the defendant only using the purported mala fides (bad faith) conduct as a farcical reason. The court thus concluded the defendants' conduct was unjustifiable.

The second issue was whether the conduct led to loss for the plaintiffs.  Concerning whether there was loss of profits due to the plaintiffs being detracted from clearing their indebtedness the court found there was insufficient evidence to support it.Similarly, on the corresponding allegation that the conduct resulted in the incurring of interests due to another creditor, the court held that  payment of interests had not been proved by the plaintiff. It thus denied the claim for both loss of profits and interest payments. 

However, the court did accept that the actions of the defendant prevented them from discharging their indebtedness and thus resulted in the incurral of interest. It thus absolved the payment of the interests that arose within the affected period and consequently snuffed the corresponding counter-claimed interests for the period.

Regarding damages, the court reasoned that the plaintiffs had acted on the impression that the title would be released to enter into some arrangements which were frustrated by the defendants' unjustified conduct. It therefore granted general damages. Similarly, because of the defendants' oppressive and high-handed conduct, the court granted punitive damages.  

This case concerns the award of damages, or not, to compensate for the negative consequences of the respondent’s repudiation of a procurement contract. In the first instance, the trial court dismissed the suit with costs after finding that there was no contract between the parties. The Court of Appeal reversed the trial court decision and awarded damages. The appellant, however, was dissatisfied with the quantum of damages awarded by the Court of Appeal and filed a further appeal to the Supreme Court, seeking damages for lost profits in addition to general damages. The respondent filed a cross-appeal proposing that the appellant’s appeal be dismissed, the decision of the Court of Appeal be reversed in part and the High court judgment and orders be restored. The respondent argued that no valid contract was entered into by the parties.

The court first considered whether there was a valid contract entered into between or executed between the parties under the 2003 PPDA Act and Regulations. PPDA section 76(3) requires that formal contracts be in writing. This requirement was not fulfilled. Consequently, no binding obligation arose out of the letter of bid acceptance. The court, therefore, dismissed the appeal filed by the appellant.

The essence of the suit was an alleged unjustified refusal by the first defendant to berth resulting in alleged loss to the plaintiff and attaching demurrage charges.

The issue was whether the first defendant deliberately refused to berth a ship, and the court found in the affirmative. The court went on to look at if the refusal was justified. The court found that the master’s refusal to berth was based on unfounded grounds resulting in a two week delay. It was on that basis that the court held that the first and second defendants had not been wrongly sued.

The other issue was whether there was delay in offloading the consignment and whether the plaintiff suffered economic loss. These losses were in a form of demurrage charges, drop in sales as a result of closure of the factory, salaries to workers and bank charges. The court relied on the principle of general damages which states that damages in law presumes follow from the type of wrong complained of. General damages do not need to be specifically have been sustained.

In the result, the suit succeeded and the plaintiff was awarded damages.