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Iniviko v Giddings [1981] PGNC 9; N282 (19 February 1981)

Unreported National Court Decisions

N282

PAPUA NEW GUINEA

[NATIONAL COURT OF JUSTICE]

(APP. 296/80)
REUBEN INIVIKO
V.
P.R. GIDDINGS

Kainantu Eastern Highlands Province

Quinlivan AJ
19 February 1981

APPEALS - Need to apply to correct forum.

“SEPARATION OF FUNCTIONS” - the Legislature decides which is the correct forum.

FIREARMS ACT - Appeal must go to District Court - National Court cannot hear appeal.

19 February 1981

QUINLIVAN AJ: This appeal against the dthe decision of the Registrar of Firearms, on 26th August, 1980, that appellant should not be issued with a permit to hold a firearm.

Many people think that, because judges are rightly said to have unlimited jurisdiction they must, necessarily, be able to do everything which a magistrate can do, and more, but this is not so. Judges can only do what the law allows or enables them to do. Nobody is above the law and the law is made by Parliament. Parliament has laid it down, by section 69 of the Firearms Act 1978 (and I feel that I should mention that the law was the same under the Firearms Regulation Act 1963 which the 1978 Act replaced on 22nd April, 1978) that all appeals in this field shall go to the District Court and section 70(2) says:

“The decision of a District Court on an appeal under section 69 is final”.

For this reason I must declare that this appeal is, in law, not an appeal at all. It must, therefore, be struck out.

It is a pity that the appellant did not have the advantage of advice from a lawyer before lodging the appeal. The fact is, however, that our system depends on what is called “the separation of functions” and it is the Legislature which decides on the forum in which appeals against the decisions of various bodies shall be heard. This court, as I have said, has no jurisdiction in regard to appeals from the decision of the Registrar of Firearms. Its only jurisdiction would be its normal supervisory one if, in hearing an appeal - or in refusing to hear an appeal - a magistrate was to divert from his/her proper course or, in some other way, fail to do his/her duty properly according to law.

No appearance by or for the Appellant

Mr. W. Neill, of Counsel of the Public Solicitor’s office: as amicus curiae

Mr. M. Darius, of the Office of the Public Prosecutor, for the State