BAILII is celebrating 24 years of free online access to the law! Would you consider making a contribution?
No donation is too small. If every visitor before 31 December gives just £1, it will have a significant impact on BAILII's ability to continue providing free access to the law.
Thank you very much for your support!

THIRD SECTION

Application no. 287/07
KENZIE GLOBAL LIMITED LTD
against Moldova
lodged on 27 December 2006

STATEMENT OF FACTS

The applicant, Kenzie Global Limited Ltd, is a company incorporated in the United Kingdom. It is represented before the Court by Ms V. Moraru, a lawyer practising in Bucharest, Romania.

The facts of the case, as submitted by the applicant, may be summarised as follows.

At the time of the events the applicant company was the creditor of a company C. which, in its turn, was the creditor of a company P. On 1 October 2005 the applicant company and company C. concluded an agreement by which the debt owed by company P. to company C. was assigned to the applicant company in lieu of the debt owed by company C. to the applicant company.

Later company P. became bankrupt and the insolvency procedure was commenced in its respect. On 10 May 2006 the applicant company requested the Chisinau Economic Court to replace company C. with itself in the list of creditors of company P. In so doing, the applicant company relied on the agreement of 1 October 2005 concluded between itself and company C.

On 5 June 2006 the Chisinau Economic Court held a public hearing in the case and upheld the applicant company’s request. As a result the applicant company replaced company C. in the list of creditors of company P. with a debt of some 14,015,000 Moldovan Lei (the equivalent of some 901,000 Euro).

On 16 October 2006 company C. lodged an appeal against the above decision on the ground, inter alia, that the person who had signed the agreement of 1 October 2005 had acted ultra vires.

On 9 November 2006 the Supreme Court of Justice examined the appeal lodged by company C. in a hearing to which the applicant company had not been summoned to appear. The Supreme Court upheld the appeal and reversed the judgment of the lower court. The decision of the Supreme Court of Justice was final and the applicant company was excluded from the list of creditors of company P.

COMPLAINTS

The applicant company complains under Articles 6 of the Convention and 1 of Protocol No. 1 that the proceedings were not fair because it had not been summoned to appear before the Supreme Court of Justice and because the Supreme Court decided to exclude it from the list of creditors of company C. despite the validity of the agreement of 1 October 2005. As a result, the applicant company pretends to have lost the possibility of recovering its debt from company P.

QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES

1.  Did the applicant company have a fair hearing in the determination of its civil rights and obligations, in accordance with Article 6 § 1 of the Convention?

2.  Has there been an interference with the applicant’s peaceful enjoyment of possessions, within the meaning of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1? If so, was that interference necessary to control the use of property in accordance with the general interest?