Review of the Supreme Court’s jurisprudence regarding the jurisdiction of cases concerning appeals against decisions of state registrars

It is contradictory to practice the application of procedural law by higher courts in relation to the jurisdiction of cases concerning appeals against decisions of state registrars. An example of such application is the Supreme Court ruling in case No. 821/592/16 dated June 20, 2018. In the present case, the plaintiff requested that the state registrar be unlawful and cancel the entry and decision to terminate another substantive law.

The Claimant noted that the state registrar did not establish the conformity of the declared rights and documents filed for registration, in particular, the presence of the fact of the fulfillment of the terms of the transaction, with which the law or relevant transaction links the possibility of occurrence, transition, termination of property rights. It would seem that in the dispute there is a defendant - a subject of authority and a justification of his violated rights by the Law on State Registration. The District Administrative Court satisfied the claim. Court of Appeal closed the proceedings in this case on the basis of clause 1, part 1, Article. 157 of the Code of Administrative Legal Proceedings of Ukraine (hereinafter referred to as the CAS Ukraine) in the version in force at the time of the issuance of this decree, as the case is subject to consideration in the procedure of economic, and not administrative proceedings.

By keeping the decision of the appellate instance unchanged, the Grand Chamber of the Supreme Court noted that the jurisdiction of the administrative courts includes disputes between natural or legal persons with a public authority, a body of local self-government, their official or official whose subject is to verify the legality of decisions, actions or inactivity of these bodies (persons), taken or executed by them in the exercise of power management functions. When determining the substantive jurisdiction of the courts, the courts must proceed from the essence of the right and / or the interest protected by the person, the claimed claims, the nature of the controversial legal relationship, the content and the legal nature of the circumstances of the case.

The defining feature of the case of administrative jurisdiction is the essence (content, nature) of the dispute. The public-law dispute, which is subject to the jurisdiction of administrative courts, is a controversy between the participants in public-law relations and relates specifically to these relations.
However, private law relations are characterized by the presence of property or non-property, personal interest of the participant. The dispute is of a private nature if it is caused by an infringement or threat of violation of private law or interest, usually of a property, a specific subject to be protected in the manner prescribed by law for the sphere of private law relations, even if the violation of private law or interest has resulted in managerial actions sub power authorities.

In violation of the decision to cancel the decision of the state registrar to terminate the state registration of property rights, namely, the sublease of a land plot, the plaintiff substantiates his claims by the fact that the impugned decision was made on the basis of unilaterally terminated unilaterally by sublease.
Thus, the unlawfulness of the actions of the state registrar during the registration of the termination of the sublease of a land plot can only be established as a result of the consideration of the case on the legality of the conclusion / termination of the lease agreement between legal entities, since, while exercising the respective functions of state registration of rights, the state registration body was not located. with the plaintiff in relations based on legal equality, free expression of will, property independence regarding the disputed right to lease land, , Therefore, could not recognize or challenge the property rights of the plaintiff in the sense of Art. 15 of the Civil Code of Ukraine.

That is, in this case, the plaintiff asks to protect his substantive right in connection with the non-fulfillment by one of the parties of the terms of a civil law agreement, and therefore this dispute is not public-law, but concerns the contractual relations and must be decided on the rules of the Civil Code of Ukraine. Thus, the Supreme Court, even though it established that the cause of the claim is a failure by the state registrar to comply with the requirements of the Law of Ukraine "On the State Registration of Real Rights to Real Estate and their Encumbrances", but pointed out that it was impossible to consider this case in the context of administrative proceedings because the factual basis for it is a dispute based on the relationship related to non-compliance with the civil law agreement.

Unfortunately, such an interpretation will not contribute to a clear benchmark for potential plaintiffs regarding jurisdiction in such disputes. And what to do if the dispute about the substantive right is filed separately, but there is a violation by the state registrar of the rules of the Law "On state registration of real rights to immovable property and their encumbrances", regardless of the owner of the thing.