EHURAN v. ATTA
1960
SUPREME COURT
GHANA
CORAM
- VAN LARE
- GRANVILLE SHARP
- SARKODEE-ADOO JJ.S.C
Areas of Law
- Property and Real Estate Law
1960
SUPREME COURT
GHANA
CORAM
AI Generated Summary
The case involves a plaintiff (respondent) claiming damages for trespass on a family land known as 'Abaka Ekyir.' The exact site of trespass was not sufficiently identified. The hearing revealed both parties occupied parts of the land without clear title tracing back to a common ancestor. The lower court sided with the defendant (appellant), but this decision was reversed without damages. On appeal, it was held that the commissioner wrongly shifted the burden of proof to the defendant. The appeal was allowed since neither party could prove clear title tracing back to the ancestor, leading to the upholding of the original municipal court decision.
JUDGMENT OF GRANVILLE SHARP J.S.C.
Granveille Sharp, J.S.C. delivered the judgment of the court: The action in connection with which this appeal arises was brought by the respondent ostensibly to recover damages for trespass from the appellant.
The summons was in the following terms:—
“The plaintiff herein claims from the defendant herein the sum of £G50 being damages for trespass committed by defendant on [p.225] plaintiff 's family land known as and called 'Abaka Ekyir' situate lying and being at Ekon in Cape Coast District of the Western Region of Ghana and bounded on one side by the land belonging to Kwamin Dadzie's family on another side by the land belonging to Kofi Buranyi's family on another side by land belonging to Kweku Donkor's family and on another side by land belonging to Tutu Dadzie's family.
And for injunction restraining the said Kweku Ehuran the defendant herein from entering on the said land or for having anything to do on the said land in dispute herein pending the hearing and determination of the above case."
The land described in the summons was depicted on a plan which was exhibited in the course of the hearing before the municipal court. It is a tract of land of considerable extent and nowhere on the plan and nowhere in the evidence that was adduced at the hearing is the place upon which trespass was alleged to have taken place identified either by description or by delineation. In fact it is apparent from the oral testimony, and from the exhibits which comprise a number of judgments in previous litigations about the same land, that the issue raised by the action for trespass was in reality an issue as to title and the general effect of the judgment of the municipal court was that on a review of the evidence it was clear that the plaintiff had failed to establish a title superior to that of the defendant in the action.
In this court the plaintiff was the respondent seeking to support the judgment of Mr. Commissioner S. A. Attoh which reversed the decision of the municipal court and entered judgment in his favour, but, significantly did not award to him any damages in respect of the alleged, but unidentified trespass. From this latter circumstance and from the judgment generally it seems clear that the learned commissioner himself treated the matter as involving a claim for title to the land.
The series of previous judgments to which we have referred were found in both courts below to establish that the root of title to the