ETHICS & INTEGRITY : " THINK LIKE A LAWYER OR THINK LIKE A SAINT!?"

Shonubi, Musoke & Co. Advocates win big at prestigious IFLR Africa Awards

Dr Alan Shonubi, a senior partner at Shonubi, Musoke & Co. Advocates receives a lifetime achievement award at the IFLR Africa Awards held in Johannesburg, South Africa. Looking on is former UBL MD Nyimpini Mabunda.

matookerepublic.com, May 14, 2024, 1:08 PM | Celebrated top city law firm Shonubi, Musoke & Co. Advocates has started the year on a high note claiming a treble of accolades at the first ever in-person International Financial Law Review- IFLR Africa Awards held in Johannesburg, South Africa on 11 April 2024. IFLR1000 is a leading international legal market research product specialised in ranking financial and corporate law firms and lawyers.

According to the IFLR website, they help consumers of legal services make informed strategic decisions when hiring external counsel. They annually rank close to 5,000 law firms and more than 21,000 lawyers across 12 practice areas and 250 jurisdictions. Uganda is one of these jurisdictions.

The first in-person Africa Awards dinner welcomed legal practitioners from across the continent to celebrate and acknowledge the most impressive achievements of the legal community in Africa. The event was held at the stylish Protea Hotel Johannesburg Balalaika and was the fourth edition of the IFLR Africa Awards. The event saw nearly 100 attendees come together to celebrate the most legally innovative financial and corporate deals, teams and firms as well as outstanding individuals over the past 12 months. The winners were decided based on a rigorous research process that involved reviewing hundreds of entries and interviews from across the African region and beyond.

IFLR’s awards are unique in the market for focusing on legal innovation through deal making and celebrating work that improves the cross-border investment environment. The 2024 Africa Awards highlight some of those most impressive legal achievements of 2023 across the continent.

Dr Alan Shonubi, a senior partner at Shonubi, Musoke & Co. Advocates gives an acceptance speech after receiving a lifetime achievement award at the IFLR Africa Awards held in Johannesburg, South Africa. Shonubi, Musoke & Co. Advocates won two other accolades as a firm.

Alan Shonubi, the senior partner at Shonubi Musoke & Co. Advocates in Kampala, won the Lifetime Achievement Award for his influence on legal practice, deal making and the cross-border environment and leadership/mentorship of the next generation of lawyers. This was the highlight award of the evening. Past winners of the award are Kojo Bentsi-Enchill, Iqbal Rajahbalee and Gbenga Oyebode.

Dr. Alan Shonubi, a senior partner at Shonubi, Musoke & Co. Advocates receives a lifetime achievement award at the IFLR Africa Awards held in Johannesburg, South Africa.

Speaking to IFLR after winning the award Shonubi stated, “I made a blind decision in 1978 to study law when I was unsure of what else to do. I made another decision in 1987 to start a law firm from scratch when I had no family members who were lawyers. I met a man in 1990 who I decided to make my mentor. He and his family encouraged and supported me in my venture. The award means I made three of the best decisions of my life”. He is committed to continue mentoring the young lawyers.

Shonubi Musoke & Co. Advocates was crowned National law firm of the year – Uganda, in addition to winning the much-coveted Loan deal of the year in respect of a receivables-based secured syndicated facility to M-Kopa Uganda Limited. This syndicated financing comprised parallel dual currency (Uganda Shillings and US Dollars) receivables-based secured facilities. The lending was backed by a mix of development finance and commercial lenders, tied together through complex intercreditor agreements. The dual-currency structure was achieved through a swap arrangement, while the financing was guaranteed by entities in the UK and Delaware. The use of such a structure is highly novel for a borrowing base deal, where lenders are lending against a pool of receivables. The complex deal, which marked the largest sustainability-linked syndicated facility in Sub-Saharan Africa in 2023, has since been replicated in other jurisdictions, including Ghana and Nigeria.

Representatives from Shonubi, Musoke & Co. Advocates pose for a photo with some of the awards the firm won at the IFLR Africa Awards held in Johannesburg, South Africa.  Shonubi, Musoke & Co. Advocates won a total of three awards.

Transactions of this nature would normally have a multiplicity of parties including mandated lead arrangers, lenders, borrowers, guarantors, agents and various local and international counsel acting for the array of the parties. Shonubi Musoke & Co. Advocates together with Allen & Overy, a London-based law firm (through its South African office), acted for the arrangers, agents and lenders. The lending institutions involved included Standard Bank of South Africa, Stanbic Bank Uganda, International Finance Corporation, Africagogreen Fund for Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency, Investments S.C.S. and Nithio FI.

ALN, whose local member is another top tier law firm-MMAKS Advocates, won the award for Legal Network of the year.

REPOSITORY/SUPPLEMENT

PARIS-2024 – O-SERIES

TENETS OF TRUST LEGACY

GLOBAL SOUTH ALERT – AFRICA –  #01 : |O| TRUST FROM SINCE MEDIEVAL ENGLAND, TO BEYOND AMERICAN DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE ON JULY 4, 1776.

YouTube: Trust Presentation Link – Overview :Express Trusts Under Common Law (Part 1) ; (Part 2) ; (Part 3) ; (Part 4).

GLOBAL SOUTH ALERT – ASIA – #02:|O| BANK NOT A TRUSTEE OR FIDUCIARY  BUT SIMPLY A DEBTOR – The contract between a bank and a customer in the decision of the House of Lords in Foley vs Hill (1848) 2 HL Cas 28

GLOBAL SOUTH ALERT – AUSTRALIA – #03:|O | MORTGAGEE (TYPALLY A LENDER SUCH AS A BANK) NOT A TRUSTEE FOR THE MORTGAGOR (BORROWER) –"It is well settled that a mortgagee is not a trustee of a power of sale for the mortgagor. Once the power has accrued, the mortgagee is entitled to exercise it for his own purposes whenever he chooses to do so. It matters not that the moment may be unpropitious and that by waiting a higher price could be obtained. He has the right to realize his security by turning it into money when he likes. [ See: Cuckmere Brick Co. Ltd Vs Mutual Finance Ltd [1971] Ch. 949 ]

GLOBALSOUTHALERT – EUROPE – #04: |O| #BANK STANDS TO LOOSE FOR FAILURE TO KEEP PROPER RECORD OF CUSTOMER ACCOUNT TRANSACTIONS – "Any bank which fails to keep proper records of accounts cannot sustain an ascertainable claim against a customer. ( See: Ezekiel Osugo Angwenyi & Another Vs. National Industrial Credit Bank Limited (2007) eKLR ]"

In Excellent Assorted Manufacturers Ltd & Anor Vs DFCU Bank Limited & Anor, Pg 81, Hon. Mr. Justice Boniface Wamala had the following important observation on that point as cited below:

. 

"It appears to me that the use of the URA receipt to explain this transaction is an attempt by the 1st Defendant to use any available documents that appear to be proximate in time to explain certain transactions even when there is no nexus between the documents. I find this trend unacceptable. Simply because a payment was done around the time the queried transaction was effected cannot be used as evidence to explain the query. Relying on a decision to which this court was referred by Counsel for the Plaintiffs, I agree that a Court of law cannot determine issues of accounts based on guesswork. 

GLOBALSOUTHALERT – NORTH AMERICA – #05:|O| #LESSEE (#BANK/END-USER) PRECLUDED FROM PASSING TITLE TO A THIRD PARTY WITHOUT PRIOR WRITTEN CONSENT FROM #LESSOR/ (#TRUSTEE/ OWNER) – Meera Investments Limited Vs DFCU Bank Limited & Anor, Civil Suit 948 of 2017 [2023] UGHCLD 340 (20th October 2023), Before: Hon. Mr. Justice Tadeo Asiimwe, CLICK LINK FOR DETAILS =>> : https://lnkd.in/eRHFGGPt

Extract:

James Magode Ikuya Vs Londa Mbarak Abdullah (HCT-04-CV-CA 87 of 2012 [2015] UGHC

"the lessee shall not without the consent of the lessor in writing deal in any way with his/her interest in the land before the lease is extended to the full term of 49 years. Paragraph 3 of the said lease provides for the need for a consent to "transfer". The lease concluded a sale and transfer of the leasehold land without seeking and obtaining the requisite consent." – Hon. Mr. Justice Henry I. Kawesi

RELATED UNITED STATES (USA) PRECEDENT:

Extract:

Cooperider Vs. Myre, 37 Ohio App. 502, 505, 175 N.E. 235, 236 (1930)

"It is no doubt true that possession of personal property is some evidence of ownership, and may be sufficient in a given case to protect one dealing with the property as that of possessor. But mere possession, unaccompanied by other circumstances giving it a specific character or creating an estoppel, is not such evidence of ownership as to prevail against the true owner, except in case of negotiable instruments, mortgaged chattel property, or that sold under conditional sales agreements."

"The rule that one cannot be divested of his property without his consent, and the principle that one cannot possess or convey a greater title than he himself has, controls all questions arising as to personal property attempted to be transferred or as to lien created thereon. The effect of possession as evidence of ownership is subordinate to these principles, save in exceptions noted. The mere fact of one putting property into the charge or custody of another does not divest the possession of the true owner; the legal possession still remains  in the owner, for the agent, bailee or lessee thereof can have no greater title than his grant provides." — Repository Citation: https://lnkd.in/e2R5fZUv

#TrustLawAlert : RENTAL CAR — ASSET BACKED SECURITY (ABS) TRANSACTION

"Most rental car fleet transactions are structured as a true lease (operating lease). In a true lease transaction, the vehicles are titled in the name of the Special Purpose Entity (SPE) with the Indenture Trustee/Custodian named as lienholder on the certificate of title. This will enable the transaction to be structured to be bankruptcy remote so that the fleet of assets can be liquidated in the event of a bankruptcy of the rental car company without a competing claim being made. on behalf of the bankrupt party's creditors." — https://lnkd.in/etmFKd-i

GLOBALSOUTHALERT – SOUTH AMERICA – #06 |O| HUMONGOUS LIQUIDITY TURNOVER : TRUST/FIDUCIARY PATIENT CAPITAL HANDSHAKE WITH ONE OR MORE BORROWER INTERMEDIARY/IES BOOSTS PLOUGHED BACK EARNINGS FOR PARTICIPATING FINANCIAL INSTITUTION/S ( TYPICALLY ONE OR MORE COMMERCIAL BANK/S). For Exhibit (1) [ Mortgage Backed Security (MBS) ]   , Please Visit: Fannie Mae : Financial Reports – FY 2021 | For Exhibit (2) [Asset Backed Security (ABS) ] ; Please Visit : Ford Variable Funding Note Prospectus, June 26, 2009 |

TAGLINE: "TREASURE THE PEARL , RIDE SPECIAL MOBILITY."

LINK: iSpecial Mobility Ecosystem

VISION STATEMENT: "WHOLE BUSINESS SECURITIZATION (WBS) FOR AFRICA AND BEYOND."

🌐 iSpecial Mobility Ecosystem