The Respondent lodged a notice of preliminary objection. It was predicated upon a single point challenging the Certificate of Delay as being misleading, problematic and invalid. The Certificate of Delay on the Record of Appeal referred to the plaintiff instead of the first defendant who was aggrieved by the decision and who was therefore the Appellant in the present appeal and in whose favour the certificate was meant. In the circumstances, the Respondent submitted that the certificate was invalid and could not be relied upon to exclude the period indicated in it. Without the Certificate of Delay, he submitted, the appeal, which ought to have been filed by 22.11.2016 but was filed on 22.03.2017, became incompetent for being filed out of time.
The Appellant readily conceded. However, he prayed that the incompetent appeal be struck out with no order as to costs.