A CJT determination directing the DIFC Courts to cease hearing a claim does not, of its own force, vacate orders the DIFC Courts lawfully made before that determination issued. The CFI judge erred in treating a prospective forum-allocation decision as a retroactive annulment of the August Orders — which included a costs award of AED 1,059,592, the setting aside of a default judgment, and the discharge of a worldwide freezing order — and in doing so without inviting any submissions from the parties. The case turns on the proper construction of Dubai Decree No. 29 of 2024 and the temporal reach of CJT decisions. Article 9(c) of the Decree, which makes CJT rules of law binding judicial precedents on all judicial entities including the DIFC Courts, operates prospectively: it subjects subsequent rulings that conflict with CJT precedent to challenge; it says nothing about orders already made. The CJT's own operative paragraphs were silent on the August Orders and contained no language of vacation or annulment. The CFI had no textual foundation for the step it took. The appeal was allowed, the October Orders set aside, and the Respondent ordered to pay AED 200,000 in appeal costs.
Decision
The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal and set aside the October Orders in their entirety. The decisive ground was narrow: the CJT's determination of 13 October 2025 did not purport to vacate the August Orders of the DIFC Court, nor did it suggest that the DIFC Court had lacked jurisdiction to make those orders. The CFI judge therefore had no basis in the CJT's text for treating the determination as retrospectively extinguishing lawfully made prior orders. Because the second issue — the true construction of the CJT's determination — was resolved in the Appellant's favour, the Court expressly declined to decide the first, constitutionally significant, issue of whether Decree No. 29 of 2024 permits a CJT determination to withdraw jurisdiction already exercised. That question was left open out of deference to the CJT, it being unnecessary to resolve it in order to dispose of the appeal. The costs order made against the Appellant on the CFI permission application of 21 January 2026 was set aside. The Respondent was ordered to pay the Appellant's costs of the appeal fixed at AED 200,000 and the Appellant's costs of the Chief Justice permission application on the standard basis to be assessed if not agreed. The third issue — procedural fairness — was not addressed, the appeal having been determined on the second issue alone.
Facts
The Appellant (Ganesan Muthiah) and the Respondent (Abdul Rahman Mohammad) are shareholders in Gulf IT Network Distribution – Freezone – LLC, a company situated in Dubai International City. Their underlying dispute concerns the dissolution and liquidation of Gulf IT; the merits of that dispute were not before the Court of Appeal. In June 2025 the Respondent commenced Claim No. CFI-055-2025 in the DIFC Court. He obtained a default judgment against the Appellant and, on an ex parte basis, a worldwide freezing order over the Appellant's assets. On 19 August 2025 the CFI made the August Orders, which comprehensively dismantled the Respondent's early gains: the default judgment was set aside; the WFO was discharged; service of the claim was declared defective; the Respondent's application for continuation of the WFO was dismissed; the Respondent's claim was struck out as an abuse of process on the basis that the Court had no jurisdiction or should not have exercised its jurisdiction to grant the default judgment; and the Respondent was ordered to pay the Appellant's costs assessed at AED 1,059,592. The Appellant subsequently applied for the appointment of a receiver over the Respondent's shares in Gulf IT to enforce that costs order. On 29 September 2025 the CFI, of its own motion, set aside its assessment of the quantum of the Appellant's costs and ordered that those costs, if not agreed, be assessed on the standard basis. In parallel, and before the CJT, positions shifted markedly: the Appellant applied to the CJT for a determination that the Dubai Courts were the competent forum. The Respondent not only failed to oppose that application but affirmatively commenced Case No. 1000 of 2025 (Commercial Major) in the Dubai Courts and sought an order from the CJT confirming Dubai Court jurisdiction, a declaration that the DIFC Courts were divested of jurisdiction, and — critically — an order suspending all proceedings in CFI-055-2025 including any related applications or appeals. On 13 October 2025 the CJT issued its determination. It noted that both parties contested DIFC Court jurisdiction and that the Respondent sought suspension of all DIFC proceedings. It concluded that, in the interests of the proper administration of justice and to avoid conflicting or inconsistent judgments, only one court should remain seized of the matter. Because the Courts of Greater Dubai enjoy general jurisdiction, the CJT determined that the Dubai Courts were the competent authority. Its operative paragraphs read: '1. The Application is allowed. 2. The Dubai Courts shall have jurisdiction to hear Case No. 1000/2025. 3. The DIFC Courts shall cease hearing Case No. CFI-055-2025.' The determination said nothing about the August Orders. On 20 October 2025, acting of its own motion and without inviting any application or submissions from either party, the CFI judge made the October Orders: the claim was dismissed; all proceedings were vacated in their entirety; all prior orders or directions were declared to have ceased to have effect; all outstanding applications — including enforcement of the costs order — were dismissed; and there was no order as to costs. The judge's reasons, issued on 13 January 2026, characterised this as formally implementing the CJT determination as a matter of constitutional and statutory delegation, with the vacation of prior orders described as an exercise of the court's costs discretion. The Appellant sought permission to appeal on 10 November 2025; that application was refused by the CFI judge on 21 January 2026, with costs ordered against the Appellant. The Appellant renewed its application before the Chief Justice, who granted permission to appeal on 26 March 2026 on all grounds other than those relating to a stay of costs orders pending appeal.
Issues before the court
- Does a CJT determination under Article 4 of Dubai Decree No. 29 of 2024 directing the DIFC Courts to cease hearing a claim operate retroactively so as to deprive of legal effect orders the DIFC Courts made before the determination issued?
- Did the CJT's determination of 13 October 2025 — on its true construction — purport to vacate the August Orders or otherwise nullify prior DIFC Court rulings?
- Was the CFI's decision to vacate all prior orders of its own motion, without inviting submissions from the parties, vitiated by a denial of procedural fairness to the Appellant?
- What is the proper temporal scope of Article 9(c) of Dubai Decree No. 29 of 2024, and does the concept of 'subsequent judicial ruling' extend to orders made before a CJT precedent was established?
The court's reasoning
The Court of Appeal approached the appeal by identifying three discrete issues and resolving it on the narrowest ground available, deliberately avoiding a constitutional ruling that was unnecessary to the outcome. Construction of the CJT's determination. The Court began with the text of the CJT's operative paragraphs, which are reproduced in full in the judgment: the Dubai Courts shall have jurisdiction over Case No. 1000/2025; the DIFC Courts shall cease hearing CFI-055-2025. The Court observed at paragraph 10 that the CJT 'did not purport to divest the DIFC Courts of jurisdiction' in respect of what had already been decided; it made no determination vacating the August Orders; and it gave no indication that the DIFC Court had lacked jurisdiction to make those orders. The language is prospective and forum-allocating. There is no word of annulment, vacation, or suspension of prior rulings. The Respondent had in fact sought from the CJT an explicit order suspending all DIFC proceedings, but the CJT did not grant that relief in its operative terms — it issued only the three paragraphs set out above. The CFI judge's characterisation of the October Orders as 'formally implementing' the CJT determination was therefore unsupported: there was nothing in the CJT's decision that required, or even permitted, vacation of the August Orders as an act of implementation. The leap from 'cease hearing' to 'all prior orders are void' was the CFI judge's own, untethered from the CJT's text. The temporal scope of Article 9(c). The Appellant argued — and the Court accepted — that Article 9(c) of Decree No. 29 of 2024 operates only prospectively. The provision declares that CJT rules of law constitute binding judicial precedents on all judicial entities at all levels, including the DIFC Courts, and that any conflict of a 'subsequent judicial ruling' with those rules provides grounds for challenging that ruling through legally prescribed means of appeal. The word 'subsequent' is the linchpin. A ruling made before the CJT decision cannot, as a matter of ordinary language and legal logic, be a subsequent ruling. The August Orders were made on 19 August 2025, nearly two months before the CJT issued its determination on 13 October 2025. They could not be caught by Article 9(c). That provision equips parties to challenge future court decisions that deviate from CJT precedent; it provides no mechanism — and no authority — for treating earlier decisions as retrospectively invalidated. Judicial restraint on the constitutional question. Having resolved the second issue in the Appellant's favour — that the CJT simply did not make the determination the CFI attributed to it — the Court turned to the first, broader question: whether the Decree as a matter of principle permits a CJT determination to withdraw jurisdiction already exercised and extinguish orders already made. The Court declined to answer. It described this abstention as deference to the CJT, recognising that any ruling on the limits of a superior constitutional body's powers was unnecessary where the appeal could be disposed of on a narrower ground. That restraint is principled and consistent with sound judicial method, but its consequence is that the constitutional question remains entirely open. A future CJT determination cast in explicitly retrospective terms would require the DIFC Courts to confront it directly. Procedural fairness. The Court found it unnecessary to address the third issue once the appeal was resolved on the second. The underlying facts are nonetheless striking: the October Orders were made by the CFI judge entirely of his own motion; neither party had made any application in relation to the orders that should follow from the CJT's determination; and neither party had been invited to make submissions before those orders were made. The judgment records those facts without further elaboration, but they signal clearly that the CFI's approach was procedurally irregular, a point of practical significance for future cases where CJT determinations fall to be implemented.
Applicable law
- Dubai Decree No. 29 of 2024, Article 4 — confers on the Conflicts of Jurisdiction Tribunal the power to determine the competent judicial entity where a conflict of jurisdiction arises between the DIFC Courts and any of the Judicial Entities (Courts of Greater Dubai), to determine the enforceable judgment where conflicting judgments have been delivered in respect of the same litigants and subject matter, and to exercise any other duties or powers assigned by the Ruler or the Chairman
- Dubai Decree No. 29 of 2024, Article 9(a) — CJT decisions are issued in the name of the Ruler
- Dubai Decree No. 29 of 2024, Article 9(b) — CJT decisions determining a competent judicial entity or an enforceable judgment are final and not subject to any form of appeal
- Dubai Decree No. 29 of 2024, Article 9(c) — rules of law established by the CJT in decisions issued pursuant to the Decree constitute binding judicial precedents; all judicial entities at all levels, including the DIFC Courts, are bound by those precedents; any conflict of a subsequent judicial ruling with any such rule provides grounds for challenging that ruling through legally prescribed means of appeal
- DIFC Court Rules (RDC) — general procedural framework governing the conduct of appeals before the Court of Appeal and the Court of Appeal's powers to set aside orders of the Court of First Instance
Practical implications
Parties who have obtained substantive DIFC Court orders before a CJT determination issues — whether costs awards, freezing orders, default judgments set aside, or declarations on jurisdiction — should proceed on the basis that those orders survive the CJT's forum-allocation decision unless the CJT itself expressly addresses them in its operative paragraphs or a separate application to the DIFC Court is made on proper notice with full submissions. The CFI's practice of acting of its own motion to void prior orders upon receipt of a CJT determination is authoritatively disapproved where the CJT's text contains no such direction. For defendants who intend to challenge DIFC jurisdiction before the CJT, timing is material in two respects. A CJT application filed after the DIFC Court has made adverse interim or substantive orders will not automatically unwind those orders; this case demonstrates that even where both parties ultimately agreed that the Dubai Courts should have jurisdiction, the August Orders — including a costs liability of AED 1,059,592 — survived the CJT's determination. Parties who wish to neutralise prior DIFC orders must pursue that relief explicitly in the CJT application itself. The Respondent here attempted exactly that, seeking suspension of all DIFC proceedings, but the CJT declined to include such relief in its operative paragraphs. Parties should therefore ensure that the specific vacation or suspension of identified prior orders is addressed in argument before the CJT and reflected, if granted, in the operative terms of the CJT's decision. Counsel implementing CJT determinations in the CFI must not assume that a cease-hearing direction carries implied authority to vacate everything that preceded it. Any housekeeping steps that follow from a CJT determination — striking out the claim, dealing with outstanding applications, addressing costs — require a proper procedural foundation: an application, notice to the other side, and an opportunity for submissions. The procedural fairness dimension identified in this judgment, though not decided, reinforces that point. Finally, the open constitutional question means that a future CJT determination using express retrospective language could produce a materially different outcome. Parties with pending DIFC proceedings and parallel CJT applications, particularly those holding interim relief or costs orders that they wish to preserve, should obtain advice on the residual risk that an explicitly worded CJT determination might be held capable of reaching back to void prior orders.
Precedent value: As a Court of Appeal decision, this judgment binds the DIFC Court of First Instance and all lower DIFC tribunals. It establishes two firm propositions. First, a CJT determination in the form 'the DIFC Courts shall cease hearing' a claim is prospective and forum-allocating; absent explicit language of vacation or annulment directed at prior orders, it does not of itself deprive lawfully made DIFC Court orders of their effect. Second, Article 9(c) of Decree No. 29 of 2024 operates only on judicial rulings made after a CJT precedent is established; orders predating the CJT determination cannot be impugned under it. The broader constitutional question — whether the Decree permits a CJT determination to withdraw jurisdiction already exercised and void orders already made — was expressly left open and remains available for determination in a future case where the CJT uses explicitly retrospective language.
Action point
If you hold a DIFC Court costs award, freezing order, or other relief obtained before a CJT determination was made, you should immediately check whether any subsequent CFI order has purported to vacate that relief. If it has, the reasoning in this judgment is likely to support an appeal or an application to restore those orders, particularly where the CJT's own operative paragraphs were silent on them. If you are managing concurrent Dubai Court and DIFC Court proceedings and are considering or have filed a CJT application, review the specific relief sought in that application: a bare cease-hearing direction will not suspend or annul prior DIFC orders, and you must ask explicitly for suspension or vacation of identified orders if that is what you need. Contact us to review your position before the CJT issues its determination.
Source
This case note is generated from a public court record and reviewed under the firm's automated editorial quality gate. General information only — it does not constitute legal advice. For advice on a specific matter, please contact us.