Reneging BR ordered to pay supplier P7.8 m with interest
Spira Tlhankane | Monday August 25, 2025 10:33
BR (respondent) had stopped paying Excess Petroleum (appellant) due to its protestation regarding the price. BR admitted that it had reneged on payment as it determined that Excess Petroleum was overcharging it.
The amount is to be paid with interest from the time of the delay thereon at the rate of 10% per annum. Excess Petroleum won a tender to supply 9,964,000 litres of fuel and delivered at the contract price of P44.8 million for five years commencing first of July 2009. Over the period, BR made partial payments while the other amounts remained unpaid.
The matter recently came before the Court of Appeal (CoA) after Excess Petroleum appealed the Registrar of the High Court’s assessment, who, contrary to the unequivocal finding of the court as liability found that no amounts were owed by the respondent to the appellant. The Registrar’s mandate was therefore to assess quantum only, liability for payment having been established, and the decision was made on September 9, 2022.
Excess Petroleum in its grounds of appeal said that, “Madame Registrar in the lower Court erred in fact and law in not upholding the appellant’s alternative argument, by not enforcing the agreement reached between the appellant and respondent on September 24, 2013, where it was agreed respondent was indebted to the appellant and was to pay them, an amount of P7.8 million pending the resolution of queried items or amounts”.
Recently, when delivering the ruling before his passing, Justice Singh Walia emphasised that the P7.8 million claims arose from the September 24, 2013, meeting held between representatives of the parties. He said on conclusion of the meeting, where aspects of the transactions between the parties were discussed, it was agreed that the respondent would pay to the appellant P7.8 million.
“Following the meeting, in an exchange of e-mails between the representatives of the parties, the respondent requested details of the appellant’s bank account where payment of the agreed amount was to be made, and details were duly provided. No payment was, however, made,” he said. Walia added that at the hearing before the Registrar, the respondent had sought to escape liability by alleging that the respondent had representatives at the meeting did not have the authority to agree to the amount.
He further revealed that under cross-examination, however, the same witness conceded that the minutes of the meeting placed before the Registrar were a true and correct reflection of what transpired at the meeting.
“Furthermore, there is nothing in the minutes to indicate that the respondent’s representatives were without authority. The respondent could not, in any event, escape liability by reliance on a lack of authority by operation of the well-known Tarquand rule. At the hearing of the appeal, the respondent’s attorney changed tack, alleging that the meeting in question was without prejudice. Not only had no basis been provided for that proposition, the tenor of the correspondence following the meeting leaves no doubt that an equivocal undertaking had been made by the respondent to make payment in the sum of P7.8 million,” Walia said.
The late now Walia said the inescapable conclusion is therefore that the claim for P7.8 million was an admitted amount and judgment should have been entered in favour of Excess Petroleum. The late judge said the Registrar was clearly in error in not giving the agreement the attention it merited.