Civil Appeal Form 6 can be issued only once -Supreme Court

The Supreme Court has ruled that Appeal Civil Form 6 can only be issued once by the Registry of an Appellate Court after the record of appeal is ready.

According to the five-member panel speaking in the opinion of Asiedu (JSC), the apex court held that there is no provision per the rules of the court for the issuance of another Civil Form 6 by a court Registrar after corrections or rectifications made to the record of appeal.

This decision has therefore changed the practice in appellate courts where the registry often issues a new Civil Form 6 after an order of rectification has been carried out. 

This was the court’s ruling on a preliminary objection raised by the Plaintiff/Respondents in the case titled; THEOPHILUS TEIKO TAGOE AND ANOR. v DR PREMPEH AND ANOR. The Respondent argued that the Court should strike out a new statement of case filed by the Appellant as the same was contrary to rules 4 and 5 of the Supreme Court Rules,1996,(C.I.6).

In response, the appellant stated that he filed a new Statement of Case after the registrar had issued a new Form 6. This was done as there was an order for rectification of the records of appeal which was granted by the court and subsequently same was rectified by the Registrar of the Court of Appeal. This, therefore, made the registrar of the Supreme Court issue a new Civil Form 6 and served it on the parties leading to the filing of another Statement of case.

The applicants thus described the preliminary objection as being without merit since if they had not filed the second Statement of Case, it would mean that their first one would have been based on the record of appeal as it existed before the rectification whereas that of the Respondents would be based on the record as rectified.

RULING

In its ruling, the Supreme Court stated that ” the rules of court make provision for the issuance of Form 6 once and this is done after the record of appeal is ready.”

Thus there is no provision for the issuance of another Form 6 by the Registrar of the Court of Appeal after corrections or rectifications had been made to the record of appeal upon the orders of this Court.”

The apex court further noted that ‘Rule 14 deals with a situation where the record of appeal had been settled by the parties and all the conditions of appeal had been fulfilled by the parties at the Registry of the Court of Appeal and the record is, thus, ready to be transmitted to this Court in order to kick-start the process leading to the hearing of the appeal.”

Additionally, the court indicated however that if the need arose for the appellants to give a further legal argument as a result of rectification, counsel should have rather applied to the court for leave to amend their already filed Statement of Case.

 Their Lordships, therefore, held that it was wrong for the Registrar of the Court to have issued a Second Form 6 and served on the parties and also for the filing of another Statement of Case by the Appellants.

Following this, the court held that the Second Statement of the case filed by the appellants was ‘duplicitous’ and thus struck out the same.