JUDGMENT OF HAYFRON BENJAMIN J.
This libel action arises out of a publication in a daily newspaper circulating in Ghana. The publication was at the instance of the defendant, then Inspector-General of Police and the Vice-Chairman of the National Liberation Council. The defendant later became a member of the Presidential Commission. It is alleged that the publication is defamatory of the plaintiff and further that the defendant in causing it to be published was actuated by express malice.
Both the plaintiff and the defendant have submitted that the defendant as a member of the National Liberation Council and the Presidential Commission occupied in law the position of the President. From these premises the plaintiff contends that he was therefore immune from legal process and that is why the action was not brought earlier. The plaintiff pleads in paragraph (2) of his reply:
"that since defendant was Vice-Chairman of the National Liberation Council and subsequently Vice-Chairman of the Presidential Commission and therefore unattainable by judicial process before 7 August 1969, the earliest date at which the plaintiff could have brought the action was 8 August 1969 when the defendant ceased to be so unattainable. And the plaintiff says that by virtue of article 36 (8) of the Constitution, 1969, this action is not statute-barred."
Article 36 (8) of the Constitution provides that: [His lordship here read the provisions as set out in the headnote and continued:]
I do not think any lengthy analysis is required to demonstrate the unsoundness of this submission. The National Liberation Council exercised the executive authority of the state, and in that sense performed the duties of the President. In all enactments, references to the President were to be read as references to the National Liberation Council. No individual member of the National Liberation Council was the President neither was any individual member of the Presidential Commission. It is argued that the Chairman or the Vice-Chairman of the National Liberation Council was authorised to sign decrees, etc. and when so signed was conclusive [p.197] evidence that it was made by the National Liberation Council. The fact that a managing director can sign a document binding on a limited liability company does not make the managing director the company. I am of the view that the defendant never was President and is not now the President of Ghana, and that the provisions of article 36 (8) of the Constitu
