MAURITIUS Law and Practice Contributed by: Sivakumaren (Robin) Mardemootoo, Natasha Behary Paray and Jeeshna (Kaajal) Radhakissoon, Dentons Mauritius LLP
in Mauritius, failing which the court may exercise its discretion to refuse enforcement. For pecuniary judgments falling under the Reciprocal Enforcement of Judgments Act 1923, the grounds for resisting registration are set out in Section 3 (2) of the Act and include the following: • the original court lacked jurisdiction; • the judgment debtor was not duly served and did not appear; • the underlying cause of action could not have been entertained by the Supreme Court on grounds of public policy. Arbitral Awards For foreign and international arbitral awards, the grounds for resisting recognition and enforcement are those set out in Article V of the New York Con- vention, which have been incorporated verbatim into domestic law by the Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards Act 2001. Recognition and enforcement can only be refused if: • the agreement is invalid; • proper notice was not given; • the award exceeds the arbitrator’s authority; • the tribunal was not properly constituted; • the award has not yet become binding or has been set aside; or • the award is contrary to public policy or is not capable of being settled by arbitration. • the judgment was obtained by fraud; • an appeal is pending or intended; or For domestic arbitral awards, while Mauritian courts have comparatively broader authority to review such awards, in practice the court conducts only a sum- mary examination to verify that: • the arbitrator was properly appointed and the award constitutes a valid arbitral award; • the award is duly signed; • the arbitration agreement was valid and regular; • the arbitrator acted within the scope of the refer- ence and within the prescribed time limit; • the arbitrator discharged the obligations imposed by law; and
• the award is not contrary to public policy. Additionally, the Code of Civil Procedure expressly provides that the Ministère Public may oppose an application for recognition and enforcement of a domestic arbitral award on public policy grounds, which will automatically bar enforcement and oust the jurisdiction of the judge to order the award.
10. Dispute Resolution and AI 10.1 Regulation
The use of AI in dispute resolution is not specifically regulated in Mauritius. Legal practitioners are none- theless bound by their existing professional and ethi- cal obligations, which would likely require them to verify that any content generated with the assistance of AI is accurate and does not amount to a misrepre- sentation or otherwise mislead the court or their client. The use of AI in dispute resolution would also typically be subject to respect for data privacy and confiden- tiality obligations. 10.2 Impact No formal assessment has been conducted on the impact of AI in dispute resolution in Mauritius. That said, it is reasonable to assume that AI tools – in par- ticular large language models (LLMs) – have already been informally adopted by legal practitioners to sup- port their work. It is also noted that AI tools tailored to the Mauritian jurisdiction are being developed by law firms for internal use, and certain AI tools have also recently been developed and marketed by local legal practitioners for wider use, though the extent of their adoption by the profession at large and their impact remain unclear. 10.3 Future Mauritian courts have not yet formally adopted AI tools to improve efficiency in their operations or decision- making processes. While there is ongoing discussion around the broader digitalisation of court procedure, there have been no announcements or discussions on the deployment of AI in courts. The recent Digital Transformation 2025–2029 blueprint of the govern- ment of Mauritius specifies that the eJudiciary system will be extended to a higher number of courts to allow
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