June 24, 2016
HIGH COURT
GHANA
CORAM
AI Generated Summary
At the High Court in Kumasi, three named plaintiffs acting for themselves and 29 other shop owners sought declarations and reliefs regarding the Anomangye-Nkwanta Stores Complex against Asomdwe House Co. Ltd. The plaintiffs claimed they, along with other artisans, prefinanced permanent stores after consultations with the Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly in 1998, paying levies (GH¢700–GH¢900; outsiders GH¢1,200), and that allocations were promised at the sites where they traded. The defendant relied on a 1999 Lands Commission lease to its predecessor GABBAT Co. Ltd and asserted the plaintiffs were tenants bound by tenancy agreements. The court, guided by a Court of Appeal decision involving plaintiff Amoako Blankson, held that contributors’ payments elevated bare licenses to profits a prendre and created proprietary estoppel and resulting trust interests. It found the 2008 consent judgment required a new company owned by all contributors; Asomdwe House was not properly formed under those terms, so tenancy agreements were void and could not estop plaintiffs. The court declared plaintiffs’ legal right to occupy, declined to declare individual ownership pending proper company formation, awarded GH¢20,000 nominal damages and GH¢20,000 costs, issued injunctive relief, and dismissed the defendant’s counterclaims.
JUDGMENT
The subject matter of the instant suit is ownership of a shopping complex at Anomangye-Nkwanta within the Kumasi Metropolis which has been the subject of several previous actions. In this particular action, the three plaintiffs sued for themselves and on behalf of 29 other shop owners claiming the reliefs as set out below:
a. Declaration that the plaintiffs and for that matter the occupiers are the rightful owners of the respective shops they occupy.
b. Declaration that any purported Tenancy Agreement executed between the occupiers and the defendant or its predecessor is null and void.
c. Damages
d. Any further order or other relief(s) as shall be just in the circumstances of this case.
e. Perpetual Injunction restraining the defendant from in any way interfering with the plaintiffs' right of quiet enjoyment.
THE PLAINTIFFS' CASE
The plaintiffs' case as gleaned from their statement of claim filed on 14/09/2010 is that prior to the construction of the shopping complex in issue, some of them were trading in kiosks at the same location. After some consultations between KMA, the school authorities and the traders in the year 1998, it was agreed that these traders make contributions to prefinance the construction of the stores; and after the construction each trader was to be allocated the stores that stand on the site they operated. The plaintiffs asserted that the initial occupants were levied GH¢700.00; outsiders were levied GH ¢900.00 and later on GH¢1,200.00 for some of the stores. It is also the plaintiffs case that it later came to their notice that a group of people had clandestinely formed a company, GABBAT CO. LTD, and had used that name to register the lease covering the land on which the building stands. It also came out, according to them, that some of their members who had been delegated to go to the Lands Commission to sort out issues after the latter had ordered them "to stop work" are the persons who had formed the company complained of. Their names were given as Takyi Brefo, Akwasi Amanfo, Daniel Bonsu and George Baffour Owusu Afriyie. Some of the contributors took legal action which culminated in a settlement. The plaintiffs further contended that some people have formed the defendant company herein and the said company has claimed ownership of these shops; which in their view is wrong.
THE DEFENDANTS CASE.
The defendant's case is that sometime in the year 1999, it entered into an agreement with the Lands Commission whereby