In a ruling concerning a dispute over an alleged forged Murabaha agreement, the Dubai Court of Cassation has affirmed that an original forgery claim before the civil courts is admissible even if the arbitral tribunal has refused to stay the arbitration proceedings to adjudicate on the issue of forgery.

The court clarified that the legislator has granted arbitral tribunals discretionary power to stay proceedings when forgery is alleged, but this does not deprive the parties of their right to file an original forgery claim before the competent courts, as long as the arbitral tribunal is not competent to decide on this matter. The court noted that the evidence law allows challenging documents for forgery through a lawsuit, and that only the failure to challenge forgery before a competent court prevents the filing of an original lawsuit, meaning that submitting a challenge to an incompetent arbitral tribunal does not extinguish this right.

The court also emphasized that if the legal provisions are clear, they must be applied as they are without deviation.

Based on the foregoing, the court found that the Appellant company had challenged the forgery before the arbitration panel and subsequently filed the original forgery lawsuit. The appealed judgment’s requirement that the arbitration panel must issue a decision to suspend arbitration proceedings for the forgery lawsuit to be admissible was deemed unlawful. The court concluded that the arbitration panels lack jurisdiction over original forgery claims.  Consequently, the appealed judgment was found to be erroneous in its application of the law and in contradiction with the established facts, resulting in its annulment and the case being remanded to the Court of Appeal for a new ruling, with the respondent ordered to pay the costs and attorney fees.