By Our Reporter
Kampala: After two consecutive wins for city business magnate and philanthropist Dr.Sudhir Ruparelia against BoU, with the latest one being on June 23 when the Court of Appeal quashed BoU’s appeal, BoU has shifted the battle ground to the media.
Few days after court of appeal’s judgement, BoU revealed that it would appeal against the ruling in the Supreme court,in which BoU’s application seeks a refund of Shs397 billion from Sudhir which he allegedly pulled out from Crane bank before it was dissolved in October, 2016.
The BoU made it’s revelation through a press statement in which they confirmed the fight is still on till they are on top of the case.
However, few minutes from BoU’s statement, Sudhir, through his lawyers of Kampala Associated Advocates (KAA), released a more detailed statement quashing BoU ‘False and Baseless statements‘-according to them, with 17 key reasons for previous wins, which caught media’s attention since it looked to be an endless battle between the two sides.
Sudhir’s statement unfortunately binned the earlier released BoU statement which looked to be another huge win for Sudhir leaving BoU beaten hands down home and away.
In a way to seek public sympathy as Sudhir’s lawyers defined it, BoU explained that they lost previous duo cases because, both the High court and Court of Appeal ruled that Crane bank had no capacity to sue them while in receivership and that upon transfer of some of it’s assets to dfcu Bank, Crane bank ceased to exist.
In Sudhir’s rebuttal, KAA noted that court determined that the case was not legally tenable as there was no cause of action. However, KAA went ahead to challenge nearly every word BoU lawyers ‘uttered’.
“Bank of Uganda makes a false allegation that taxpayers’ money was used to settle Crane bank depositors. This statement is used several times in the press statement but it is not part of the case Bank of Uganda filed. It is an allegation designed to sway public opinion, and has nothing to do with the case,” reads part of KAA’s statement.
“Parliament of Uganda’s (Cosase committee) have all reported that there was no evidence to support Bank of Uganda’s claims that taxpayers’ money was allegedly spent on paying depositors. Money went missing from Bank of Uganda and remains unaccounted for.”KAA Statement continued.
The revelations don’t end there. BoU claims a deal had been reached with Sudhir on March 20, 2017 to pay back $60m in a Settlement and Release Agreement before he allegedly breached the arrangement and that it was on this basis that BoU sought legal redress.
However, KAA insists the case BoU filed in both courts did not include any claims of any kind or any allegations of any kind in relation to a settlement agreement with Sudhir.
These comes at a time when every one is eager to see the conclusion of this battle including tax payers who are the key victims ahead of a Supreme court hearing in the case filed by Crane Bank Limited (in Receivership) versus Sudhir Ruparelia and Meera Investments Limited.
In dismissing the appeal, the Court of Appeal held that the trial judge was satisfied that the preliminary points of law which the respondents raised were based on the presumption that the facts in the plaint were true and that the points of law, if upheld, were sufficient to conclude the case.
Court of Appeal Justices, Alphonse Owiny Dollo; Cheborion Barishaki and Stephen Musota agreed with an earlier ruling by Commercial Court Judge Justice David K. Wangutusi’s August 26th 2019 that a bank in receivership (Crane Bank Limited in this case), under the Financial Institutions Act (2004) cannot sue or be sued and therefore Crane Bank (in receivership) cannot and should not have sued businessman Sudhir Ruparelia and his company Meera Investments Limited.
