Supreme Court bench

Toropo’s Stay Order Application Incompetent

The decision made by Justice George Manuhu, Justice Colin Makail and Justice Ere Kariko read that the ruling was based on the competency of the application.

On January 14, 2022, former Defence Force Commander Gilbert Toropo through his lawyer, Kopunya lawyers applied to a single Judge of the Supreme Court to set aside orders of January 5th 2022.

Court Reserves Decision To Later Date

The matter returned this morning after it was adjourned from Monday, 7th of February 2022.  It was presided by Justice George Manuhu, Justice Colin Makail and Justice Ere Kariko.

As per the decision of the one-man Supreme Court bench on January 14th, 2022, Justice Derek Hartshorn said the matter should be made before a full bench of the high Court as provided by the Supreme Court Rules.

The three-man bench today said they have heard arguments and reserved its decision to a later date.

OC application to add evidence refused

A Supreme Court bench consisting of five judges refused the application because it was incompetent and an abuse of the court process.

The court will now proceed to hear arguments from parties in the reference under section 18 (1) of the constitution. This will take place at a later time.

The application which was refused last Friday was filed on Oct 20.

The application asked the five-man Supreme Court bench to allow the Ombudsman Commission to include additional materials or facts into the reference book, to assist the court in its deliberation of the reference.

OC asks to add more materials for reference

The application was moved by Ombudsman Commission Lawyer Vergil Narokobi, which resulted in the court deferring the hearing of the actual reference to a later date.

The application asked the five-man Supreme Court bench to allow the Ombudsman Commission to include additional materials or facts into the reference book, to assist the court in its deliberation.

Filed on Oct 26 this year, the application asked the court to add three sets of facts containing materials which the Ombudsman Commission says is necessary for the full court to have.

Supreme Court bench dismisses UBS loan case

The case was dismissed for warrant of prosecution after Don Polye’s lawyer Loani Henao failed to appear in court in time for the hearing at 9:30 this morning.

Lawyer representing the Prime Minister and the NEC Ian Molloy was in court when the matter got dismissed.

What was returnable this morning was a standing application where Polye was to inform the court through his lawyer that he had enough grounds to challenge the Government’s decision to acquire the K3 billion UBS loan.