VIP Engineering & Another vs Standard Chartered Bank & Others (Civil Appeal No. 1092 of 2024) [2025] TZCA 1131 (16 October 2025)

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF TANZANIA AT PAR ES SALAAM (CORAM: LEVIRA. J.A., MGONYA. 3.A. And MDEMll. 3. A.1 ) CIVIL APPEAL NO. 1092 OF 2024 VIP ENGENEERING AND MARKETING LIMITED.........................APPELLANT VERSUS STANDARD CHARTERED BANK ....................................... 1 st RESPONDENT STANDARD CHARTERED BANK (HONG KONG) LIMITED .... 2noRESPONDENT STANDARD CHARTERED BANK (TANZANIA) LIMITED ....... 3 rd RESPONDENT JOINT LIQUIDATORS OF MECHMAR CORPORATION (MALAYSIA)BERHAD.................................................... 4 th RESPONDENT WARTSILA NETHERLANDS B.V ........................................ 5 th RESPONDENT WARTSILA TANZANIA LIMITED......................................6™ RESPONDENT (Appeal from the Ruling of the High Court of Tanzania, at Dar es Salaam) (Maahimbi. 3.) dated the 12th day of March, 2024 in Miscellaneous Civil Application No. 518 of 2023 RULING OF THE COURT 6th & Iff" October, 2025 MDEMU. J.A.: In Miscellaneous Civil Application No. 518 of 2023, Standard Chartered Bank, Standard Chartered Bank (Hong Kong) Limited and Standard Chartered Bank (Tanzania) Limited, the 1s t, 2n dand 3r d respondents respectively, filed an application to the High Court for an order that Civil Case No. 229 of 2013 pending before it, be dismissed in their favour. The i

said suit was initiated at the instance of the appellant against all the respondents. The High Court (Maghimbi, 1) heard the parties in that application and in the end, allowed it with an order of striking out Civil Case No. 229 of 2013. This was on 12th March, 2024. The appellant was aggrieved by the said decision, thus filed the present appeal armed with sixteen grounds of complaint. Before the parties were heard on the grounds of appeal so filed by the appellant, Mr. Gasper Nyika, assisted by Mr. DeogratiusTesha and Ms. Edina Mwankenja, all learned advocates for the 1s t, 2n d , 3r d and 4th respondents, informed the Court that, in the course of preparation for the hearing of the appeal, it came to his attention that, the notice and the memorandum of appeal contain names of respondents who were not parties in the original Misc. Civil Application No. 518 of 2023, being the subject of the instant appeal. In the latter, parties were: Standard Chartered Bank (Hong Kong) Limited, Standard chartered Bank PLC and Standard Chartered Bank (Tanzania) Limited as applicants and VIP Engineering and Marketing Limited being the respondent. This, he added, was not the case to the notice and memorandum of appeal in which, three more names of respondents who were not parties to the original application, were joined. He mentioned them as Joint Liquidators of Mechmar Corporation (Malaysia) Berhad, Wartsila Netherlands B.V. and Wartsila Tanzania Limited.

Adding more on the contents of the notice of appeal, Mr. Nyika submitted that, the notice is challenging the ruling of the High Court (Maghimbi, J.) which was delivered on 12th March, 2023 in Civil Case No. 229 of 2013. He argued further that, the said decision does not exist because, to his understanding, on that date, the learned Judge delivered a ruling in Misc. Civil Application No. 518 of 2023 and not Civil Case No. 229 of 2013 stated in the notice of appeal. His word of advice was that, the appellant could have served the notice of appeal on the respondents who were not parties to Civil Application No. 518 of 2023 in terms of rule 84 (1) of the Tanzania Court of Appeal Rules, 2009 (the Rules) and from that point, leave of the Court was to be sought to join those respondents. As there was no leave of the Court prior sought and obtained, the appeal becomes incompetent, thus persuaded us to hold so and proceed to strike it out. He bolstered his stance by citing the following cases: Helena Adam Elisha @ Hellen Silas Masui v. Yahaya Shabani & Another (Civil Application No. 118/01 of 2019) [2012] TZCA 669 (11 November 2021; TanzLII), Isaack Wilfred Kasanga v. Standard Chartered Bank Tanzania Limited (Civil Application No. 453/01 of 2019) [2022] TZCA 222 (22 April 2022; TanzLII) and CRDB Bank PLC (formerly CRDB (1996) Ltd, v. George Mathew Kilindu (Civil Appeal No. 110 of 2017) [2020] TZCA 361 (23 July 2020;TanzLII).

Submitting in reply to the raised objection, Mr. Respicius Didace, learned advocate teaming up with Messrs. Dosca Mutabuzi, Michael Ngalo and Deogratius Mwarabu ail leaned advocates, conceded that, the 4th , 5th and 6th respondents were not parties in Misc. Civil Application IM o. 518 of 2023, which was the original application and the subject of the instant appeal. He however submitted the following reasons for the inclusion in the notice and memorandum of appeal: First, that, the advocate for the 1s t, 2n d , 3rd and 4th respondents deliberately omitted the said respondents in Misc. Civil Application No. 518 of 2023 as they were parties in Civil Case No. 229 of 2013 sought to be dismissed. Second, Misc. Civil Application No. 518 of 2023 originated from Civil Case No. 229 of 2013. Third, the ruling in Misc. Civil Application No. 518 of 2023 led to the striking out of Civii Case No. 229 of 2013 and fourth, that the joined respondents in the appeal would be affected by its outcome. Mr. Ngalo was of the same stance. He, together with Mr. Didace thereafter, submitted further in their reply that, service of the notice of appeal on the affected respondents in terms of rule 84 (1) of the Rules which Mr. Nyika argued to be the proper forum, is in fact, not mandatory. Finally, Mr. Didace urged us to exercise our powers of revision under section 6 (2) of the Appellate Jurisdiction Act, Cap. 114 (the AJA) to correct the irregularities in both Misc. Civil Application No. 518 of 2023 and that in

Civil Case No. 229 of 2013. To him, this remains the proper approach to deal with substantive justice among and between the parties. Mr. Daudi Ramadhani who appeared to represent the 5th and 6th respondents associated himself with Mr. Nyika's stance without more. When Mr. Nyika's time for rejoinder came, he was brief that, the proper forum to challenge what the appellant's counsel stated as Mr. Nyika's deliberate acts to omit other respondents in Misc. Civil Application No. 518 of 2023, is part of the substantive appeal. He rejoined further that, Misc. Civil Application No. 518 of 2023 is a stand-alone application and is the subject of the instant appeal. It cannot be determined together with Civil Case No. 229 of 2013, so is the impracticability of using revisional powers of the Court because the appellant's remedy is one of appealing and not revision. The latter, according to Mr. Nyika, is not an alternative to appeal. He finally reiterated his stance to invoke rule 84 (1) of the Rules which, unlike the appellants stance, the rule is coached in mandatory terms to serve the interested or affected parties to the intended appeal. From what parties submitted for and against the objection, the question that calls for our determination is whether it was proper for the appellant to include, in the notice and memorandum of appeal, the 4th , 5th , and 6th respondents who were not parties in the original Misc. Civil Application No. 518 of 2023. Our starting point is as reflected in what the

Court observed in Isaack Wilfred Kasanga (supra) that, as a matter of principle and consistency in how proceedings should reflect, citing all parties involved must be observed and maintained. In the matter before us, we note that, in both the notice and memorandum of appeal, the 4th , 5th and 6th respondents are new names which were not parties in the original civil application whose ruling is the subject of the instant appeal. Again, we note that, the said respondents were defendants in Civil Case No. 229 of 2013. The latter is not before us and in fact, it is still pending before the High Court, Dar es Salaam Registry. What we note further is that, the appellant simply selected the names of three defendants in the pending Civil Case No. 229 of 2013 and added them in the notice and memorandum of appeal originating from a different case, that is, Misc. Civil Application No. 518 of 2023. This, in our stance, was odd and was without leave of the Court. The Court in CRDB Bank PLC (formerly CRDB (1996) Ltd (supra), made the following findings regarding citing new names in appeals: "...it is our considered view that citing o f all these new names for the appellant without leave or order o f the courtis a fatal irregularity which has affected the competence o f the entire appeal and cannot be rectified by a slip of Rule as we decided in the case o f Inter-Consuit Limited (supra) cited to us by Mr. Masumbuko . "

In addition, the argument of Mr. Didace that the trio were joined on account that their advocate deliberately omitted them during the filing of Misc. Civil Application No. 518 of 2023 as they were parties in Civil Case No. 229 of 2013, do not hold any substance because two wrongs cannot cleanse unrighteousness or ratify what was otherwise wrong to be right. Again, we are unable to accept Mr. Didace's argument that, it was proper to join the three respondents because the ruling in Misc. Civil Application No. 518 of 2023 led to the striking out of Civil Case No. 229 of 2013 in which the joined respondents were defendants. Equally, we are not prepared to take the view that, Misc. Civil Application No. 518 of 2023 originated from Civil Case No. 229 of 2013. The former was filed as a separate and distinct application as rightly argued by Mr. Nyika. Moreover, Mr. Nyika guided, and we find to be a proper guidance that, on seeing that the joined respondents would be affected by the outcome of the intended appeal, the proper avenue for the appellant was to serve them with the notice of appeal in terms of rule 84 (1) of the Rules. It is stated in that rule that: "An intended appellant shall, before, or within fourteen days after lodging a notice o f appeal, serve copies o f it on all persons who seem to him to be directly affected by the appeal; but the Court may, on an ex parte application, direct that service need

not be effected on any person who took no part in the proceedings in the High Court." It is following such service, we believe, the appellant or the respondents so named in the notice and memorandum of appeal would have sought leave of the Court to be joined in the intended appeal. In CRDB Bank PLC (formerly CRDB (1996) Ltd (supra), we observed that, the right of appeal is for the parties who have been involved in the original suit. We add that, save for leave of the court, a person who was not a party in the original suit, may not be joined as a respondent in a notice and or memorandum of appeal on a mere belief that the outcome of the intended appeal would adversely affect that person. Last for our consideration is Mr. Didace's invitation for our powers of revision under section 6 (2) of the AJA. For ease of reference, the said section reads as hereunder: "Foraiipurposes o fand incidental to the hearing and determination o f any appeal in the exercise o f the jurisdiction conferred upon it by this Act, the Court of Appeal shall, in addition to any other power, authority andjurisdiction conferred by this Act, have the power o f revision and the power, authority and jurisdiction vested in the Court from which the appeal is brought " This argument should not detain us unnecessarily. For the Court to exercise its powers of revision in the exercise of its appellate jurisdiction, 8

the section presupposes that the appeal must be properly before the Court. We stated above that, the instant appeal is incompetent for including names of persons in the notice and memorandum of appeal who were not parties in the original application without leave of the court. That being the case, the Court cannot exercise its revisional jurisdiction under section 6 (2) of AJA in an incompetent appeal. We feel to rest this point at this stage. Having said the foregoing, we are of the firm view that the appeal before us is incompetent and in the end, we proceed to strike it out with costs. DATED at DAR ES SALAAM this 15th day of October, 2025. Ruling delivered this 16th day of October, 2025 in presence of Ms. Dosca Mutabuzi, learned counsel for the Appellant, Mr. Idrissa Juma, learned counsel for the 1s t, 2n d , 3rd and 4th Respondents and Mr. Daudi Ramadhani, learned counsel for the 5th and 6th Respondents via virtual court from Dar es Salaam and Mr. Magesa Fabiane Mgeta, Court Clerk; is hereby certified as a t M. C.LEVIRA JUSTICE OF APPEAL L. E. MGONYA JUSTICE OF APPEAL G. J. MDEMU JUSTICE OF APPEAL W. A. HAMZA DEPUTY REGISTRAR COURT OF APPEAL