The judge is not required to explain to the litigant the right to request the application of the statute of limitations in Vietnam

The jugment below is an example, specifically:

The Judgment 06/2018/DSST dated May 28, 2018 of the People's Court of Phu Ninh district, Phu Tho province on civil contract disputes has the following contents:

“On July 31, 2012, Ms. Tran Thi Thanh T signed a credit contract with Vietnam Prosperity Commercial Joint Stock Bank to borrow an amount of VND 25,200,000, with a loan term of 18 months and divided into 18 repayment periods. During the loan process, Ms. T has paid the Bank for 7 periods with a total amount of VND 15,274,000. The payment period is on the 1st of every month and starts from September 1, 2012. From April 3, 2014, Ms. T failed to fulfill the debt repayment obligation for the remaining 11 periods. This debt is now past due. Now, the Bank files a lawsuit demanding that Ms. T be obliged to pay the Bank the total amount of principal and interest.”

The contract's deadline is February 1, 2014, by the time of February 1, 2014, Ms. T did not fulfill her payment obligations, therefore, infringing on the rights and interests of VPBank. The statute of limitations for initiating a lawsuit requesting the Court to settle a contractual dispute is 3 years from the date the obligee knows or ought to know his/her lawful rights and interests have been violated. The statute of limitations for VPBank to exercise the right to initiate is from February 2, 2014 to the end of February 2, 2017. The statute of limitations has expired.

Regarding the statute of limitations for initiating lawsuits, the People's Court of Phu Ninh district made the following observations: Pursuant to Clause 2, Article 149 of the 2015 Civil Code and Article 184 of the 2015 Civil Procedure Code, the Court only applies the statute of limitations. at the request of a party or parties to apply the statute of limitations, provided that this request must be made before the first-instance Court issues a judgment or decision. According to the guidance in Section 7, Dispatch 152/TANDTC-PC dated July 19, 2017 of the TANDTC on settlement of credit contract disputes and bad debt settlement also provided specific instructions on the application of the statute of limitations when Dispute settlement of credit contracts. At the trial, the authorized representative of the Plaintiff did not request the Court to apply the statute of limitations.

For the defendant, Ms. Tran Thi Thanh T, although she has been duly notified by the Court of the acceptance of the case and publicly posted the procedural documents for Ms. T to exercise her procedural rights and obligations Ms. T was intentionally absent, giving up her book and obligations. Therefore, even though the above-mentioned credit contract has expired, the time limit for requesting the Court to be settled has expired, but based on the above-mentioned legal provisions, the Court still resolves the case in accordance with the law.

Therefore, the Court shall only apply the statute of limitations upon the request of a party or parties to apply the statute of limitations, provided that this request must be made before the first-instance Court issues a judgment or decision to resolve the issue a judgment and decide to settle the case. If the statute of limitations expires but the parties do not request the Court to apply, the Court will still handle the case normally.

In practice, it is a difficult matter for the litigant to grasp the right to request the application of the statute of limitations. Some Judges explain the right to request the application of the statute of limitations to the litigant and there are Judges who do not explain to the litigant. So the legal consequences in these two cases will be different. If the Judge explains that the involved parties request the application of the statute of limitations, the Court will suspend the settlement of the case according to the provisions of Article 217 of the Civil Procedure Code 2015 of Vietnam. If the Judge does not explain and the involved parties do not know. If you have this right to request an application, the Court will still handle the case normally.

The law does not require the Court to explain to the involved parties to exercise this right, so the Supreme People's Court issued Official Dispatch 89/TANDTC-PC dated June 30, 2020 on the announcement of the results of online answers to a number of problems in the trial, including the problem of explaining to the litigants the right to apply the statute of limitations as follows:

“3. During the settlement of the case, must the judge explain to the involved parties the right to request the court to apply the statute of limitations? (In many cases, the involved parties did not understand and the procedure-conducting people did not explain before the Court pronounces the first-instance judgment, resulting in the litigants losing the right to request the application of the statute of limitations).

According to the provisions of Articles 48, 210, and 239 of the Civil Procedure Code of Vietnam, the judge or the presiding judge of the court session is responsible for disseminating and explaining the rights and obligations to the involved parties in the cases that the Ministry the Civil Procedure Law stipulates, for example, the rights and obligations of the litigants specified in Articles 70 to 73; Clause 6, Article 48 of the Civil Procedure Code… The Civil Procedure Code does not stipulate the judge's responsibility for disseminating and explaining to the involved parties the right to request the application of the statute of limitations. On the other hand, Clause 2, Article 184 of the Civil Procedure Code stipulates: “The court shall only apply the statute of limitations upon the request of a party or parties to apply the statute of limitations, provided that such request must be submitted. before the first-instance court issues a judgment or decision to settle the case...".

In order to ensure equality of rights and obligations between involved parties during the settlement of the case, the Judge does not explain to the involved parties the right to request the application of the statute of limitations.

Please Login to be able to download