Information Note on the Court’s case-law No. 90
October 2006
Pokis v. Latvia (dec.) - 528/02
Decision 5.10.2006 [Section III]
Article 6
Civil proceedings
Article 6-1
Civil rights and obligations
Shareholder of a limited-liability company being wound up objects to measures relating directly and exclusively to the company’s capital:article 6 not applicable
Article 34
Victim
Shareholder of a limited-liability company being wound up objects to measures relating directly and exclusively to the company’s capital:inadmissible
The applicant held shares in a limited-liability company. The company was placed under judicial administration and a liquidator was appointed. Disagreeing with some of the steps taken in the liquidation proceedings, the applicant brought a court action challenging the decisions taken by the meeting of creditors and the actions of the liquidator. In his action he criticised the decision to increase the company’s share capital, certain shortcomings and irregularities in the recovery plan adopted by the meeting of creditors and the competence of the liquidator. The action was declared inadmissible.
Inadmissible under Article 6(1) – Applicability: Latvian law did not confer on ordinary shareholders the capacity to act in the context of liquidation proceedings. The impugned proceedings had related solely to the company as a legal entity and not to the applicant. Although the company had been placed under judicial administration, it had not thereby ceased to exist as a legal entity, and it had continued to have its own separate assets. The measures criticised by the applicant had related directly to the company’s capital, that is, the capital of a separate legal entity, and not to his own assets. While the liquidation measures had affected the financial interests of the applicant as a member of the company, the effects on him were too indirect and remote to be regarded as “directly decisive” for his individual property rights: incompatibleratione materiae.
Inadmissible under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1: Victim status: Shares in limited‑liability companies amounted to “possessions”. Shareholders complaining of measures taken in winding up a company, which was a separate legal entity, or of another infringement of that entity’s rights, could not claim to be “victims” of a violation of their individual rights under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1.
© Council of Europe/European Court of Human Rights
This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.
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