ANNA VICTORIA BART v. NANA EGYEI FOAH

J U D G M E N T

GBADEGBE JSC:

This is an appeal from the decision of the Court of Appeal that affirmed the decision of the High Court, Cape Coast in an action that turned on the ownership of a piece or parcel of land situate at Momofra Akyenim in the Central Region. It appears from the judgment of the Court of Appeal that the leaned judges accepted the determination of the trial High court. Delivering the judgment of the court, Piesare JA (as he then was) said by way of a comment on the appeal before them as follows:

“At the end of the day, the trial judge gave a straightforward and comprehensive judgment dismissing the plaintiff-appellant’s claim, and entered judgment in favour of the defendant on his counterclaim. We have carefully examined the judgment, and we have no good reason to disturb that judgment.”

In our view the facts that led to the issue of the writ of summons herein in the trial court were as said by the learned judge of the Court of Appeal whose pronouncement has just been quoted relatively simple and turned on the question as to who owned the disputed land that on the admitted evidence was first acquired by the plaintiff’s family by purchase. The defendant while admitting the prior ownership of the plaintiff’s family pleaded a grant from the family to his predecessors in title on September 22, 1944. The said transaction of sale on which the defendant relied was covered by a deed that was registered as No 273A/1945. The relevant pleadings of the defendant on how they came to be possessed of the disputed land was averred to in paragraphs 7–10 of the statement of defence, which in our view provided the plaintiff with what we consider to be a full and frank disclosure of the reason why their claim of title to the land was being resisted. Reference is made shortly afterward in this delivery to the relevant pleadings for a better appreciation of the very narrow compass within which the action ought to have been contested in the trial court having regard to the case put forward by the parties. Since the defendant admitted the prior ownership of the plaintiff but relied on a purchase by his ancestors from the plaintiff’s predecessors in title, we think that the right to begin at the trial rested on the defendant and accordingly in considering the pleadings filed on their behalf in the trial Court, we commence with that of the defendant. The relevant pleadings of the defendant that answer the plaintiff’s averment as to title that is asserted i