LEGAL PRINCIPLE: APPELLATE PRACTICE — Fresh Evidence — Conditions for Admission on Appeal — Three Special Grounds Must Co-Exist
PRINCIPLE STATEMENT
The grounds upon which further evidence can be allowed are: (a) the evidence sought to be adduced must be such as could not have with reasonable diligence been obtained for use at the trial; (b) the evidence should be such as if admitted, it would have an important, not necessarily crucial, effect on the whole case; and (c) the evidence must be such as is apparently credible in the sense that it is capable of being believed although it need not be incontrovertible. All three special grounds must co-exist.
RATIO DECIDENDI (SOURCE)
Per Onu, JSC Iweka v. S.C.O.A. (Nigeria) Limited (2000) NLC-2311992(SC) at p. 12; Paras. B–E.
"The grounds upon which further evidence can be allowed are: (a) the evidence sought to be adduced must be such as could not have with reasonable diligence been obtained for use at the trial; (b) the evidence should be such as if admitted, it would have an important, not necessarily crucial, effect on the whole case; and (c) the evidence must be such as is apparently credible in the sense that it is capable of being believed although it need not be incontrovertible. All three special grounds must co-exist."
EXPLANATION / SCOPE
The admission of fresh evidence on appeal is governed by strict cumulative conditions. First, the evidence must have been unobtainable with reasonable diligence before trial. Second, it must be important (though not necessarily decisive) to the outcome. Third, it must be apparently credible. These three requirements co-exist—failure to satisfy any one bars admission. This restrictive approach balances the need for finality in litigation against the imperative of ensuring that justice is not defeated by the exclusion of genuinely new, significant, and credible evidence that could not have been presented earlier.