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Nivah Intergrated Development Company v Attorney General [2007] SBHC 96; HCSI-CC 102 OF 2007 HCFJ 97 OF 2007 (16 August 2007)

HIGH COURT OF SOLOMON ISLANDS

Civil Case No. 102 of 2007

NIVAH INTEGRATED DEVELOPMENT COMPANY

v

ATTORNEY-GENERAL
(Represented by the Commissioner of Forests)

Date of Hearing: 16 August 2007
Date of Ruling: 16 August 2007

A. Nori for Plaintiff/Applicant
D. Damilea for Attorney-General (Commissioner of Forests) Defendant

RULING on application for certiorari to quash Commissioner of Forest’s claim to cancel timber rights application

Brown, J:

1. I refuse the adjournment.

The motion to quash the Commissioner of Forests purported cancellation of the Timber Rights Application shall proceed. I appreciate the difficult circumstances in which Mr. Damilea finds himself for that he is in breach of Regulation 9 of the Legal Practitioner Regulations but in the exercise of my inherent power, I allow him to appear today.

2. I have heard what he says about the Commissioner’s attitude towards his refusal to reconsider his letter of the 7 December 2006. In that letter the Commissioner expressed his reasons why, he was cancelling the application by NIDEO for a logging licence over Sanalae land. In paragraph 1 of that letter he points to the fact that Lamupeza Tribe owns the land the subject of NIDECO’s concession. He says he has in his file legal documents which substantiate this.

Unfortunately those claiming under such legal documents, whatever they are, have failed to take steps in accordance with the process set out in Part III of the F&TU Act, for that NIDECO has been found by the Provincial Executive to be the lawful representatives of all landowners able to grant timber rights.

In the absence of any appeal by the Lamupeza Tribe from the Executives decision to the WCLAC on the 19 May 2006 a certificate of no appeal issued so that the Executives decision must be afforded the inviolate status accorded it under Part III, s. 10[1] of the Act.

3. Any claim by a landowner in this event can only be a claim against the named representatives for a share of benefits but cannot affect the right in those representatives to proceed with the grant in their discretion, of timber rights. I see there is an appropriate agreement [or Form 4] dated the 28 June 2006 in favour of Bulacan Intergrated Wood Industries.

In all the circumstances on balance the plaintiff has made out its case.

The purported cancellation of the Applicants/Plaintiff’s timber rights application under land of the Commissioner on the 7 December 2006 is void and of no effect. It is accordingly quashed.

4. The respondent shall pay the costs of the application.

THE COURT