Kuwait Court of Cassation principle number 2111

Registration of properties before it was entrusted to the Courts Department in 1932 AD. The competence of the late Sheikh Abdullah Al-Adsani in this respect, and after him judges of the Al-Adsani family. Contracts drawn up at that time are called Adsani documents. They are considered Sharia deeds in official instruments and evidence of the deed holder’s ownership of the real estate stated therein. The Adsani document continued to suffice in itself during application of the Majalla of Judicial Provisions and while Registration Law No. 5 of 1959 was in force. - The provision in Article 14 of Law No. 5 of 1959, amended by Law 73 of 1979. Previously registered instruments mean Sharia documents subsequent to the introduction of the real estate registration system in 1932. Instruments whose dates were authenticated or which were certified before a notary public or the Sharia courts before 26/4/1960 mean private instruments. The addressee of this article is the authority entrusted with registration, without prejudice to the authority of courts, which may rely upon any evidence establishing real estate ownership, provided it is a legally recognized means of proof. - Official documents. The court may rely upon them in ascertaining real estate ownership. The original need not exist for them to be relied upon, provided their particulars appear in another official document or documents sufficiently indicating the original’s prior existence. - Final adjudication. It acquires the force of res judicata only as regards disputes arising between the litigants and decided by the court expressly or implicitly. Its implication. Failure to register a judgment declaring a sale contract valid and enforceable in order to transfer ownership to the purchaser. Has no effect on its binding force between its parties and on preventing them from raising what has previously been decided in a - 393 - Obligation necessary express or inevitable implicit manner in any subsequent action, even with new legal or factual evidence. - Acknowledgment of ownership. It is a waiver by the acknowledging party of his right to require his adversary to prove the ownership claimed, and a declaration by him of that adversary’s prior ownership. It is considered evidence against the acknowledging party without requiring registration, because it is not an instrument of title but evidence thereof. The condition for this: that it be made by the acknowledging party with free and conscious will. A litigant’s reliance on the acknowledgment and its significance. A substantive defence. Disregarding it constitutes deficient reasoning vitiating the judgment.