Practice and procedure—Judgment—Date of entry—Decision of ordinary bench of
Court of Appeal allowing appeal announced on 13 February 1979 but reserving
reasons—Effect of decision—Whether decision operative from date of
announcement—High Court (Civil Procedure) Rules, 1954 (L.N.140A), Order 41, r. 3.
Practice and procedure—Judgment—Reasons—Reservation of—Effect—Desirability
of giving reasons for decisions—Whether any principle of natural justice that reasons
be given for decision—Whether any practice rule that decisions and reasons be given
on same date—Rationale for announcement first of decision and handing down later
of reasons for—Whether absence of reasons for decision derogating from intrinsic
quality of decision.
Practice and procedure—Review—Extension of time—Six months’ maximum time
allowed for filing application for extension of time to apply for review—Decision of
ordinary bench of Court of Appeal announced on 13 February 1979—Reasons for
decision subsequently delivered on 29 March 1979—Application for extension of time
to apply to full bench for review filed on 27 September 1979—Whether time for
application running from date of decision or from date when reasons given—Whether
application statute-barred—Courts (Amendment) Decree, 1972 (N.R.C.D. 101), s. 6—
Supreme Court Rules, 1970 (C.I. 13), r. 8.
Courts—Court of Appeal—Full bench—Jurisdiction—Article 122 of the Constitution,
1979, providing wholly appellate jurisdiction for Court of Appeal—Under article 121 (2)
Court of Appeal duly constituted by three judges—Neither a review jurisdiction nor a
full bench of the Court of Appeal provided for in the Constitution—Whether court’s
review jurisdiction and corollary power to sit as full bench under N.R.C.D. 101, s. 3
abolished—N.R.C.D. 101 s. 3—Constitution, 1979, arts. 121 (2) and 122.