Kuwait Court of Cassation principle number 118

Summary: - Chairman of the National Council for Culture, Arts and Letters. His competence to issue a decision registering family sites and historical buildings. - Compensation claimed by the persons concerned where registered properties have not been expropriated. It is borne by the aforementioned National Council as the body responsible for preserving antiquities. The challenged judgment's departure from this and its ordering all the appellants (including other administrative bodies) to pay provisional compensation. A violation of the law requiring its partial cassation in respect of the provisional compensation awarded. Rule: Article (11) of Amiri Decree No. (11) of 1960 concerning the Antiquities Law, as amended by Law No. (9) of 1994, provides that: "If the National Council for Culture, Arts and Letters does not expropriate the registered archaeological site or historical building within a year of its registration, its owner may claim compensation for the registration from this Council." The import of this provision is that the legislature, after vesting the Chairman of the National Council for Culture, Arts and Letters with competence to issue decisions registering archaeological sites and historical buildings, charged the Council with the amount of compensation claimed by the persons concerned where the registered properties have not been expropriated. It expressly provided that a claim for compensation for registration in this case is to be directed against the Council alone, as the body responsible for preserving antiquities. That being so, the challenged judgment, after establishing that the property in dispute had not been expropriated within a year of its registration and that the two respondents were entitled to claim compensation for that registration pursuant to Article (11) of the aforementioned Antiquities Law, ordered all the appellants to pay the provisional compensation claimed, whereas the National Council for Culture, Arts and Letters alone is liable for that compensation, as explained above. It therefore violated the law, requiring its partial cassation in respect of the compensation awarded on this ground, without any need to examine the remaining grounds of the two appeals.