Re Soni Prashant

CACV 558/2019

[2020] HKCA 636

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF APPEAL

CIVIL APPEAL NO 558 OF 2019

(ON APPEAL FROM HCAL 2883/2018)

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J U D G M E N T

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Hon Lam VP (giving the Judgment of the Court):

1.On 1 June 2020, the Applicant filed his Notice of Motion to apply for leave to appeal to the Court of Final Appeal against this Court’s (Lam VP and S T Poon J) judgment of 25 May 2020.

2.Section 22(1)(b) of the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal Ordinance, Cap 484 provides that an appeal shall lie to the Court of Final Appeal (“CFA”) at the discretion of this Court or the CFA if the question involved in the appeal is one which, by reason of its great general or public importance, or otherwise, ought to be submitted to the CFA for decision.

3.Further, in the exercise of discretion in granting leave, this Court will consider if there is any reasonably arguable ground to support the application.

4.The Applicant has set out the following as grounds for appeal in his Notice of Motion:

“ 1. The learned Judges were wrong as a matter of law for not having applied the principle of irrationality to the decision made by the director of Immigration on 10 May 2018 refusing my application for Judicial review.

2. The learned Judges were wrong as a matter of law for not having applied the principle of procedural unfairness to the decision of the director where by the director was required to give reasons justifying the decision.

3. The option of relocation is a mere joke.  Nobody can hide in Pakistan under new anti-terrorism laws.  Anyone with money can hire a corrupt police officer and pay him to search me with one click.” [sic]

5.The Applicant’s written submissions of 9 June 2020 consist largely of general statements of law with quotations from case law, without identifying how they specifically relate to or apply in this case.

6.The first two grounds raised in the Notice of Motion were general statements without particulars.  The Applicant failed to pay heed to the observations at [11], [15] to [17] of the judgment of 25 May 2020.  They could not provide any discernible grounds for leave to appeal to the CFA. 

7.The third ground is not understood as the Applicant is an Indian national.

8.Thus, the Applicant has not raised any reasonably arguable ground to support leave to appeal to the CFA to be granted.

9.For these reasons, we refuse to grant leave to appeal to the CFA.  We dismiss the Notice of Motion of 1 June 2020 accordingly.

The applicant acting in person