A MAGENDRAN A/L ARUMUGAM v HANISAH BEGUM BINTI M. NAGOOR HASHAN

Case Significance

A clear illustration of the strict requirements for reviving a limitation period — a written and signed acknowledgment or part-payment under sections 26 and 27 of the Limitation Act 1953 — and of the striking-out jurisdiction being used where a claim is plainly and obviously statute-barred.

This High Court decision at Johor Bahru is an appeal from the Magistrates' Court in a claim to recover money lent under a loan arrangement. The Magistrate had allowed the respondent's application under Order 18 rule 19 of the Rules of Court 2012 and struck out the appellant's writ and statement of claim on the ground that the action was barred by section 6(1)(a) of the Limitation Act 1953, which fixes a six-year period running from the date the cause of action accrued. On appeal, the appellant sought to persuade the court that the Magistrate had erred in law and fact by failing to take into account a payment said to have been made in 2017, which, he argued, should have altered the date on which the cause of action accrued and so saved the claim from being time-barred. The court admitted an account statement as additional evidence at the appeal stage and analysed both the nature of the alleged breach and the requirements for reviving a limitation period. It held that the case involved a single completed breach rather than a continuing one, so that time ran from the original default, and that sections 26 and 27 of the Limitation Act 1953 require a written and signed acknowledgment or part-payment to revive a limitation period — a requirement not satisfied on the facts. The court explained that a payment made after a breach does not, without more, reset the limitation clock; only a written acknowledgment or part-payment answering the statutory description will do so, and a bare assertion that some payment was made in 2017 could not meet that standard. On that basis the court was satisfied that the claim was plainly and obviously time-barred and that the Magistrate had not erred in striking it out. It dismissed the appeal in its entirety, upheld the Magistrate's decision without amendment, and ordered costs of RM3,000. The judgment is a useful illustration of the strict requirements for reviving a limitation period and of the use of the striking-out jurisdiction where a claim is plainly statute-barred.