The Court of Appeal has stopped Dooba Enterprises, a prominent hardware shop in Kampala, from evicting ordinary people from a piece of land in Namanve that the firm had claimed it had purchased during an action by Housing Finance Bank.
The court dismissed most of the appeal by Dooba Enterprises and upheld the finding that Carolyn Sylvia Cope and Moses Mainuka were lawful occupants of the land.
The land originally belonged to Robert Sserwanga , who was the first registered proprietor. In 2012, Sserwanga sold kibanja or equitable interests on the land to different people. Carolyn Sylvia Cope bought a kibanja on plot 196, while Wetaase Frobisher bought a kibanja on plot 195. Frobisher later sold his kibanja interest to Mainuka.
All these transactions were witnessed and stamped by the local council one chairperson, a common practice in rural and peri urban Uganda.
After selling the kibanja interests, Sserwanga later sold his legal interest to Frobisher. Years later, the land somehow ended up mortgaged to Housing Finance Bank by Shine Group Limited, a company that was not part of the earlier kibanja transactions.
Housing Finance Bank instructed Armstrong Limited, an auctioneer, to sell it. In stepped Dooba Enterprises who bought the land in December 2016 through that auction process.
Trouble began when Dooba moved onto the land in 2018, fenced it off, and compensated some people who were growing crops there. Sylvia Cope and Mainuka then emerged, claiming that they had lawful kibanja interests and that their crops and boundary markers had been destroyed.
Dooba Enterprises sued Cope and Mainuka in the Mukono Chief Magistrate’s Court, asking the court to declare it the rightful owner, declare the duo trespassers, order their eviction, and award damages.
Its lawyers argued that when Dooba bought the land, the only people on it were members of the family of the late Desideriyo Lubwama , who were compensated and left. They insisted that Cope and Mainuka were never in possession of the land and had no genuine interests there.
The company also argued that under the Land Act, a registered proprietor like Sserwanga could not sell a kibanja interest on his own land.
Cope and Mainuka told court Dooba’s version of events was false.
They testified that they had bought their kibanja interests lawfully in 2012 and had been using the land to grow crops such as beans, maize and groundnuts. They said they were never compensated and that Dooba destroyed their crops, removed concrete boundary markers, and fenced off the land with the help of police.
The LC I chairperson, Godfrey Kisombo backed their account. He told court that he informed Dooba, from the very beginning, that Cope and Mainuka were tenants on the land with kibanja interests. He said he even travelled to Kakiri to notify Cope about the new landlord and reported her interest back to Dooba.
The Chief Magistrate initially ruled in favour of Dooba Enterprises, finding that Cope and Mainuka were neither lawful occupants nor kibanja holders.
On appeal, the High Court overturned that decision, ruling that Cope and Mainuka were lawful occupants and awarded them Shs20 million in general damages.
Not satisfied, Dooba then took the matter to the Court of Appeal.
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Justice Esta Nambayo of the Court of Appeal carefully retraced the evidence and the law. She rejected Dooba’s claim that the kibanja agreements were fake, noting that Dooba had produced no evidence to prove fraud.
“The appellant [Dooba] did not present any evidence to show that the agreements presented by the respondents were concocted or manufactured,” Justice Nambayo said.
The court accepted the evidence of the LC 1 chairperson and found that Dooba had knowledge of the occupants’ interests before fencing off the land.
“I find no reason to doubt the evidence of the LC1 chairperson that he notified the appellant that the respondents had equitable interest on the land,” Justice Nambayo said.
The court held that Cope and Mainuka qualified as lawful occupants under Section 29(1)(b) of the Land Act, which recognises a purchaser who entered land with the consent of the registered owner.
However, the Court of Appeal faulted the High Court for introducing allegations of fraud involving Shine Group Limited, which was not a party to the case.
The court warned that fraud must be specifically pleaded and proved, and courts should not make orders against non parties.
