Singapore And Hong Kong Courts Maintain High Bars Against Arbitration Case Management Complaints

Singapore and Hong Kong remain as two of the most preferred seats for international arbitration in the Asia-Pacific region. According to 2015, 2018 and 2021 rounds of international arbitration surveys conducted by Queen Mary University of London, both jurisdictions are consistently highly rated by users of arbitration, rivalling the likes of London and Paris. This popularity is in no small part due to the pro-arbitration and pro-enforcement reputation of their courts, even in the face of dubious challenges against an award at the enforcement stage.

These include the notorious "due process violations," which often take the form of a party against whom the award is (or will be) invoked alleging a case management irregularity in the underlying arbitration. In this regard, the UNCITRAL Model Law on International Commercial Arbitration, which the Singapore International Arbitration Act 1994 (at s.3(1)) and the Hong Kong Arbitration Ordinance (2014) (at s.4) have largely