RULING OF THE COURT
1. Prior to the promulgation of our current Constitution, this Court was the apex court in the land as well as the court of last resort in respect of disputes lodged in the judicial system. As such, decisions of this Court were considered final and binding. Therefore, save for the limited jurisdiction prescribed under Rule 35 of the Court of Appeal Rules, to correct clerical or arithmetical errors, this Court could not re-open or look back into its decision once it was made.
2. The above position was informed by the principle of finality which is hinged on the public interest policy that litigation must come to an end. Bosire, J.A in Jasbir Singh Rai and 3 Others v. Tarlochan Singh Rai and 4 Others [2007] eKLR succinctly described the principle as follows:
“This is a doctrine which enables the courts to say litigation must end at a certain point regardless of what the parties think of the decision which has been handed down.”
Further, the finality principle dealt with …