Justice Patience Rubagumya of the Commercial Division of the High Court has directed the consolidation of three suits filed against Bank of Uganda and ABSA bank which resulted from fraudulent dealing on a customer’s bank account.
The directive resulted from the application filed by both banks seeking for consolidation of the three suits after they insisted that the reliefs sought by the plaintiff in all the suits are arising from the same series of the same transactions deemed as unauthorized, unlawful and irregularly debited between 1st July, 2018 and 1st July, 2019, from Aloysious Lubega’s personal bank accounts and his two companies viz, Bulamu Mixed Farm Products limited and Alnet Top Notch Points Limited.
The banks through their lawyers of MMAKS Advocates and K&K Advocates insist that the suits are in their early stages of adjudication, being the stage of scheduling noting that the order of consolidation will not cause any hardship to the parties.
In the evidence affidavit sworn by Philip Nsaja, an advocate in the matter told court that separate trials would result in duplication of evidence, repetitive witness testimony, and a risk of inconsistent findings by the same Court on the same factual and legal issues yet they share the same facts which the preceding judge agreed with.
However, Lubega and his companies through his lawyers of Mugwisa, Webisa & Company Advocates protested the application submitting that there is no single transaction, debit instruction, or authorization common to all three suits, and that there is no factual or legal basis for treating the impugned transactions as one transaction or as a single series of transactions.
Lawyer Emmanuel Kyenga swore an evidence affidavit challenging the application told court that consolidation of the three suits will improperly mix distinct banking relationships, distinct account holders, and distinct transactional histories, contrary to settled principles governing banker-customer relationships and fair trial.
According to court documents, Lubega and his companies hold bank accounts numbers 6005763604, No. 6005503793, and No. 6004977503 with Absa bank at its Hannington Road Branch.
According to Lubega, sometime around July, 2019, they noticed peculiar transactions on their bank account involving irregular and unauthorized debits of monies from the respective account.
He requested a bank account statement from Absa for the period between 1st July, 2018, and 1st July, 2019 which were provided and he discovered unclear debits from his respective accounts.
He claims Absa bank accounts No. 6005763604 had an irregular debit of Shs299m, on bank account No. 6005503793 had an unauthorized debit of Shs298m and for account No. 6004975503 had an unauthorized debit of Shs247m.
He complained to both banks about the illegalities but they were ignored, hence their respective suits.
“Due to the above reasons, it is my considered view that these facts show that the suits against the Applicants raise similar questions of law, such as; whether the 1st Applicant lawfully debited the Respondents’ accounts, whether the 1st Applicant breached its relationship with the Respondents, whether the 2nd Applicant breached its statutory duty to supervise the 1st Applicant, and what remedies are available to the parties,” the judge stated in her ruling.
