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JUDGMENT
OFOE, J. A:
The whole appeal before us is mainly dependent on what view we hold of the following provisions.
Section 8(1) of the Legal Profession Act 1960, Act 32“A person other than the Attorney General, or an officer of the Attorney General’s Department, shall not practice as a solicitor unless that person has in respect of that practice a valid annual solicitor’s license issued by the Council in the form set out in the 2nd Schedule of this Act”Rule 4 of the Legal Profession (Professional Conduct and Etiquette)Rules 1969(L. I 613) also provides as follows: “All professional chambers shall be registered with the General Legal Council”What do we make of these provisions as regards processes signed and filed in court by an unlicensed legal practitioner? The background to this appeal can be stated as follows: The plaintiff filed a writ of summons on the 29th of April 2013 seeking by an order of specific performance the transfer of a certain property into his name.
The defendant entered a conditional appearance on the 13th May 2013 to be followed by a statement of defence on the 28th of May 2013. On the 4th of June 2013 the defendant moved the court to strike out the plaintiffs suit as incompetent on the grounds that the solicitor for the plaintiff, Mr. Justin Teriwajah, did not have a practicing license as a solicitor when he issued and signed the writ of summons and the statement of claim and was also operating from an unregistered chambers.
The trial judge upheld the preliminary objection and concluded that: “The effect of failing to satisfy the mandatory provisions of the said Act is that it renders the writ issued by present counsel during the period he was unlicensed as invalid”Relying on the Supreme Court case of Gaisie Zwennes, Hughes &Co. vrs Loders Crocklam BV reported in the 2012, volume 1 edition she concluded that the plaintiff’s suit was incompetent and struck it out.
In submissions before the trial court counsel for the plaintiff, Mr. Teriwajah sought a referral to the Supreme Court for interpretation whether on the combined reading of Articles 296(a) and (b) and 196 of the 1992 Constitution there could be retrospective operation of the license issued to him as to bring the validity of his license that was issued to him on the 29th November 2012 to an end the same year December 2012 instead of November 2013. The trial judge ruled that the plaintiff was at liberty to sue the General Legal Counsel and raise this constitutional issue.
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