Introduction

1. Locus standi or legal standing, that is a litigant’s legal capacity to participate in the specific case before the Court, and which is traditionally used to determine a claimant’s right to sue was expressly extended by the Singapore High Court in the landmark decision of Chye Hwa Luan & 2 Ors v Do Allyn T [2023] SGHCR 10 (Chye Hwa Luan) to refer - with equal importance - to a defendant’s right to defend the suit.
2. To be more precise, the Singapore High Court in that case held that a claimant must not only establish its own legal capacity to commence an action, but the claimant must also ensure that the defendant it chooses to sue has the necessary legal capacity to defend the action. A failure to do so would subject the case liable to be struck out or thrown out of court.
3. This unique legal point arose in the Chye Hwa Luan case when the claimants there committed two small but significant procedural errors in the commencement of their suit: first, the claimants brought the case against the defendant in her personal, instead of representative, capacity even though they were in reality seeking a remedy against her as “administrator of the estate of the deceased”; and second, the plaintiffs mistakenly thought the defendant had already acquired the representative capacity in question even though as a matter of law, she did not.
4. We will briefly unpack the Chye Hwa Luan decision in this article and conclude with some learning points for all litigants, particularly in the law of succession, moving forward.

Summary of the facts of the Chye Hwa Luan case

5. On 28 January 2022, the plaintiffs commenced an action against the defendant, who is the wife of one Mr Chan Chong Leong, deceased, claiming among other things the following reliefs: (i) a declaration that the deceased held his ½ share of a property registered in his name, in trust for the 1^st and 2^nd plaintiffs jointly and severally; and (ii) an order that the defendant, as administrator of the deceased’s estate, transfer to the 1^st and 2^nd plaintiffs the ½ share of the property registered in the deceased’s name within 3 months of the judgment.
6. The plaintiffs’ reason for seeking those reliefs against the defendant is apparently because the defendant had already applied for, and obtained, an order for letters of administration in respect of the deceased’s estate to be granted to her. The plaintiffs took this course of action notwithstanding that they knew that the defendant had yet to extract the actual grant of letters of administration under seal and could not have done so at the time of the suit because of the caveat that the plaintiffs themselves had lodged over the deceased’s estate.
7. On 28 April 2023, the defendant, after being served with a copy of the Writ of Summons and the Statement of Claim, entered an appearance in the suit, and applied to strike out the plaintiffs’ claim in its entirety.
8. The defendant’s main contention was a procedural but fundamental one namely that the grant of letters of administration under seal was the official document conferring the requisite authority to an administrator to deal with matters of the deceased’s estate, and since the defendant had not extracted the grant of letters of administration yet, the defendant – notwithstanding that the Court had ordered that letters of administration in respect of the deceased’s estate to be granted to her - had no legal standing to defend the suit.
9. In short, the defendant contends that plaintiffs had jumped the gun in suing the defendant so the suit against her was flawed and should be dismissed.
10. Prior to the hearing, the plaintiffs filed written submissions to resist the defendant’s striking out application but the plaintiffs eventually had a change of heart at the hearing on 15 May 2023 and informed the Court at the start of the hearing that they were taking no position on the defendant’s application save to suggest that any procedural error on their part could be overcome by an amendment to reflect the defendant’s capacity as the “personal representative of the deceased’s estate”.
11. The Singapore High Court thus had to determine the following three simple but important legal questions:

1. what was the capacity in which the plaintiffs were suing the defendant?
2. if the plaintiffs were suing the defendant in the capacity as administratrix of the estate, whether the commencement of the suit and all the actions taken thus far in the proceedings against the defendant in that representative capacity as administratrix - when the defendant has not yet extracted the grant of letters of administration - amounts to a legal nullity; and
3. if the answer to second legal question is in the affirmative, whether the amendment suggested by the plaintiffs could address the procedural error.

Summary of the Court’s decision in the Chye Hwa Luan case

12. On the first legal question, the Singapore High Court found that the plaintiffs had inadvertently brought the claim against the defendant in her personal capacity (even though they intended otherwise) when they failed to endorse in the Writ of Summons that the defendant was sued in a representative capacity as mandated by Order 6 rule 2(1)(d) of the Rules of Court 2014, and further failed to reflect the intended representative capacity of the defendant in the title of action in the Statement of Claim as mandated by the rule in In re Tottenham [1896] 1 Ch 628.
13. However, the Singapore High Court did not consider the plaintiffs’ failure in this regard to immediately be fatal to their claim as the Court could still go on to consider the second (and main) issue of whether the defendant had the authority to act on behalf of the deceased’s estate and defend the claim brought in the suit.
14. On the second legal question, the Singapore High Court referred to the case authority of S M K R Meyappa Chetty v S N Supramanian Chetty [1916] 1 AC 603 for the well-settled proposition that there is a distinction between an executor’s authority (which is derived from the will appointing the executor) and an administrator’s authority (which is derived entirely from the grant of administration appointing the administrator).
15. The Singapore High Court then emphasized that in view of the earlier decision of Singapore Gems Co v. Personal representatives of the estate of Akber Ali Mohamed Bukardeem, deceased [1992] 1 SLR(R) 362, the prevailing legal position in Singapore is that the extraction of the grant of the letters of administration is the dispositive act conferring the requisite authority and title to the administrator. Without the sealed letters of administration being extracted, the administrator could not be sued in respect of the deceased’s estate.
16. Accordingly, the Singapore High Court held that since the defendant in the Chye Hwa Luan case did not extract the grant of letters of administration, the defendant was clearly not in the eyes of the law, the administratrix of the deceased’s estate and had no authority to act on behalf of the estate.
17. The Singapore High Court also held that if a claimant had brought a claim against a respondent in a representative capacity, but it turns out that the respondent did not have the authority to act in that representative capacity, the claimants could not have a reasonable cause of action against the respondent and the claim should correspondingly be struck out.
18. The Singapore High Court reasoned that if a respondent did not possess the requisite legal standing, there would be no basis on which the Court can grant the reliefs sought against the respondent nor does the respondent have the legal capacity to comply with any orders made against it.
19. On the third legal question, the Court found that the amendment suggested by the plaintiffs would not be able to address the procedural error because the amendment is premised on the defendant being a personal representative of the deceased’s estate but since the defendant was neither the executrix nor administratrix of the deceased’s estate, she was not a personal representative and the Writ of Summons could not be validly amended in that manner.
20. The High Court thus held that the suit was a nullity and bad in law. Accordingly, the High Court allowed the defendant’s application and struck out the suit in its entirety.

Conclusion

21. Having regard to the summary above, we consider there to be three key takeaways from the Chye Hwa Luan case:

1. First, a party purporting to represent a deceased’s intestate estate as administrator, be it the claimant or the respondent must ensure that he or she has not only obtained the order from the Family Justice Courts for a grant of letters of administration to issue, but he or she must also have extracted the sealed letters of administration. This is because following the Chye Hwa Luan case, it is now beyond doubt that without extracting the grant of letters of administration, that party has neither the title nor the authority to act on behalf of the estate whether in prosecuting or defending a claim.
2. Second, after the Chye Hwa Luan case, it is not only important for a claimant to ensure that it has the requisite legal standing to sue, but the claimant and the respondent alike should also carefully consider whether the respondent has the legal capacity to defend the claim or comply with the order sought by the claimant. If the respondent does not have that legal capacity, the claim may be inherently flawed and subject to a possible striking out. Such a respondent should further consider whether the claim can be summarily dealt with by way of a striking out application.
3. Third, and notwithstanding the Chye Hwa Luan case, a claimant can still bring a claim against an estate even if the administrator has not extracted the grant of letters of administration but in that event, the proper way is for a claimant to bring the claim against the estate instead of naming any particular defendant, and thereafter make an application to Court for a suitable person to be appointed to act for the estate. If there is no suitable person, the claimant can always apply for the Official Assignee to be appointed to represent the estate.

22. In conclusion, after the Chye Hwa Luan case, it is no longer just important to pay attention to the legal standing of the claimant, it is now equally important to ensure that the respondent has the necessary legal standing to act in relation to the matter.
23. Dentons Rodyk successfully acted for the defendant in striking out the claim in the Chye Hwa Luan case. If you are intending to bring or defend a claim in the capacity as a personal representative of a deceased person and would like to find out more on what we can do for you to ensure the propriety of the action, please reach out to us.