CA-2024-001254 - [2025] EWCA Civ 961

The application was heard by the Judge on 18 to 20 March 2024, and on 2 April 2024 he handed down judgment granting summary judgment against JNFX for the entirety of the deceit claims.

I will have to look at some of the detail of the judgment in due course, but for present purposes can summarise it quite briefly. At [1]-[9] he gave an introduction, in the course of which he identified the issues as being (i) whether Mr Mervyn was guilty of deceit; (ii) whether Mr Mervyn had ostensible authority to act for JNFX; (iii) whether JNFX’s standard terms and conditions applied to the contracts; and (iv) a question of quantum ([7]-[8]). At [9] he identified that it was not necessary to consider either the question of Mr Mervyn’s actual authority (Mr Giwa did maintain that Mr Mervyn had actual authority but did not seek to rely on that for the purposes of the application), or the question of illegality under Nigerian law (it being accepted by Mr Wigley for JNFX that that issue only impacted on the contractual claims).

At [10]-[11] he summarised the applicable legal principles in terms that Ms Addy did not criticise, her submission being that although he had directed himself correctly, he had not in fact applied the principles correctly.

At [12]-[16] he considered the representations and rejected the submission for JNFX that with further disclosure and cross-examination there was a realistic prospect of showing that the representations were not made. At [17]-[26] he dealt with the falsity of the representations, and at [27] with a suggestion that Mr Giwa did not rely on the representations, concluding at [28] that JNFX had no realistic prospect of defending the deceit claim against Mr Mervyn.

At [29]-[38] he considered the question of Mr Mervyn’s ostensible authority. At [24] he said he agreed with Mr Giwa that the evidence that he did have ostensible authority was overwhelming, and he concluded at [38] that he was not persuaded that JNFX had a realistic prospect of showing the contrary.

At [39]-[42] he considered and rejected the suggestion that there was a prospect of showing that JNFX’s standard terms and conditions were incorporated into the contracts.

At [43]-[48] he dealt with quantum, holding that the sums claimed (in the total of NGN 7,914,209,196.50) were justified.

By his Order dated 15 May 2024 he therefore gave summary judgment in favour of Mr Giwa on his claims in deceit against JNFX and ordered JNFX to pay Mr Giwa NGN 7,914,209,196.50 with compound interest at 8%. He also gave summary judgment for damages for deceit against Mr Mervyn and Frontier and judgment in default for Mr Giwa’s other claims against them, with which we are not concerned.