ABABIO v. THE STATE
1966
SUPREME COURT
GHANA
CORAM
- MILLS-ODOI
- AKAINYAH
- LASSEY JJ.S.C
Areas of Law
- Criminal Law and Procedure
- Constitutional Law
- Evidence Law
1966
SUPREME COURT
GHANA
CORAM
AI Generated Summary
The appellant, convicted of obstructing a district commissioner from taking possession of stool property, appealed on grounds of a defective charge and judicial handling of law without formal proof. The court upheld the conviction, finding that the omission of certain terms in the charge did not lead to a substantial miscarriage of justice. The court's procedure of taking judicial notice of statutory instruments without formal proof was deemed appropriate, affirming that the laws, being public documents, did not necessarily require formal evidence in criminal cases.
JUDGMENT OF LASSEY J.S.C.
Lassey J.S.C. delivered the judgment of the court. The appellant, a queenmother in Ashanti, was convicted at the District Magistrate's Court, Kumasi, on a count wherein the statement of offence was “obstructing an officer from taking possession of stool property: contrary to section 56 (4) of Act 81 and Executive Instrument No. 46 of 1963 made under section 56 of Act 81 of 1961." Section 56 (4) of the Chieftaincy Act, 1961,1 makes it an offence for "A person who wilfully obstructs any authority or officer who has been ordered to take possession of Stool property under this section." Executive Instrument No. 46 of 1963 was made by the Minister of Justice on 10 April 1963, in exercise of the powers conferred on him by subsection (1) (c) of section 56 of Act 81 whereby he ordered one Kwame Opoku Agyeman, District Commissioner, Agona, to take possession of the Ntonso stool property and thereafter to hand it over to one Nana Yiadom Boakye-Ansah, Ntonsohene. The said executive instrument was tendered in evidence at the trial and marked as exhibit A2. Under section 56 (1) of Act 81 "officer" therein stated was defined as a "public officer."
On arraignment before the district magistrate in Kumasi the particulars of the offence which were read and explained to the appellant read as follows:
“Nana Akosua Ababio Akyea, alias Afra, queenmother, for that you on 24 July 1965, at Suame, in Ashanti Magisterial District and within the jurisdiction of this court wilfully obstructed one Kwame Opoku Agyemang, District Commissioner, Agona, who had been ordered to take possession of five black stools, property of the Ntonso stool.”
The appellant, who pleaded not guilty, admitted at the trial that she had the custody or possession of the stool properties in question, but [p.424] tried to justify her right to keep them in view of a dispute affecting the rightful occupant of the Ntonso stool at the time. She appealed against her conviction and sentence by the District Court, Kumasi, to the High Court, Kumasi, but her said appeal was dismissed. She has again appealed to this court against the decision of the High Court, Kumasi, dismissing her appeal on six grounds of appeal. At the hearing, the appeal was argued principally on two grounds which read as follows:
"(1) The judge erred in law by holding as he did, that because an executive instrument is an enactment within the meaning of article 40 (b) of the Constitution of Ghana, 1960, then an executi