Court has ruled that a bill worth Shs147.2 million issued by National Water and Sewerage Corporation (NWSC) to Kabira Country Club Limited was in error.
Justice Musa Ssekaana of the High Court in Kampala said ruled that there was no evidence that Kabira Country Club consumed the water upon which the bill was issued.
In 2017 NWSC issued an invoice of Shs147,260,805 to Kabira Country Club, claiming that the latter had consumed 37,623 units of water between 2013 to 2017.
But Kabira Country Club protested the move and sued NWSC on accusations of breach of contract, saying that they were not indebted in anyway.
Court records indicate that NWSC installed water meters on commercial premises of Kabira country club with different meters serving different sections of the same premises in 2010.
According to the court documents, Meter Number SOCAM/96-723763 was specifically being used by Kampala International School which was occupying that part of the Kabira club premises and she used to settle bills for that meter until sometime in 2013 when the school ceased its operations and that NWSC was informed of the closure and the meter was no longer in use.
Witnesses testified that during renovation exercise, Kabira Country Club demolished the buildings and facilities used by the school and the same were left excavated, vacant and physically disconnected from the system of NWSC.
“In 2017, the water pipe and valve of NWSC were damaged resulting in heavy leakage of water. The plaintiff (Kabira country Club) informed the defendant (NWSC) of the leakage which had resulted from the construction of road works in area by Kampala Capital city Authority (KCCA) but the defendant delayed to rectify the problem and the plaintiff’s plumbers made several attempts of addressing the problem which always failed,” read the court documents .
According to the court judgment, NWSC’s staff repaired the water leakage later and took the meter in 2017 upon which they issued a bill of Shs147,260,805 as an outstanding bill of the said meter and started issuing invoices upon refusal to settle the contested bill the defendant disconnected Kabira Country club.
NWSC had contended that the said meter was being used for water consumption by Kabira Country Club but no invoice had been issued in respect of the said meter since 2013.
In his ruling, Justice Ssekaana said Kabira Country Club never consumed any water on the meter and any demands or bill based on the same meter reading when it was removed for repairs after leakages is very erroneous and baseless.
“The circumstances of this case as presented in evidence show that the defendant’s claim is premised on assumptions and conjecture after they went on the plaintiff’s premises to carry out repairs and discovery of the meter is contrary to the existing state of affairs and the same is not supported by evidence,” he held.
Justice Ssekaana observed that NWSC did not challenge the evidence presented by Kabira Country club in regard to the notification, NWSC not issuing any bills over the period 2013 to 2017 and that the water meter gate valve was closed off so as to block the flow of water.
“The fact that the defendant never issued any bills on this meter prior to 2017 indicates that there was no water consumed on this water meter,” he added.