GOLD COAST INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION v. DUNCAN

JUDGMENT OF GRANVILLE SHARP J.A.

Granville Sharp J.A. delivered the judgment of the Court:

The plaintiffs' claim is for money lent by plaintiffs to defendant at his request, together with interest thereon and attendant expenses specified in the particulars, altogether amounting to £4.590. 14s. 2d.

The basis of the plaintiffs' claim is an agreement in writing between the parties dated 25th August, 1952. Amongst other provisions the agreement stipulates specific dates upon which periodic repayments of the loan and interest should be made. It is not in dispute that at the date the writ was issued no repayment had been made, and by the date of the trial the whole sum was due and payable, as the last date for payment had passed.

The only defence to this claim is an averment on behalf of the defendant that the plaintiffs had committed a breach of their contract or agreement with the defendant to finance the defendant's cassava business or project, and are not entitled to claim the said sum of £4,590: 14s: 2d, or any part thereof. This averment, as appears from the plea, was based upon a contention that in July 1949, or thereabout, the plaintiffs had agreed to give the defendant adequate financial assistance to enable him to establish his cassava project on a "commercial scale," and that in reliance on this promise the defendant had expended moneys in connection with a factory and cassava plantation and the necessary staff of assistants, all of which moneys have been lost to him by reason of plaintiffs' alleged breach of agreement. The defendant, therefore, by way of set-off or counter-claim sought to recover from the plaintiffs a sum of £13,614 as damages for breach of contract, and for the losses which he has suffered by reason of such breach. Defendant also alleged that when he applied to the plaintiffs for a further loan of £3,000 in about March, 1952, the plaintiffs declined to advance the said sum, although (as the defendant contended) the plaintiffs had promised to advance it.

No part of the agreement alleged by the defendant is evidenced by any document in writing, but the defendant explained that it was his contention that the plaintiffs operated on the authority of the Industrial Development Corporation Ordinance and that under that [p.447] Ordinance they were obliged to finance his cassava project up to the stage at which it could be said to be a viable commercial project. Thus we understood the argument of Counsel for the defendant to be.

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