2013
SUPREME COURT
GHANA
CORAM
AI Generated Summary
Dr. S. K. Date-Bah, JSC, delivering the lead ruling, addressed an application by the applicants, including deponent Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, seeking review of the Supreme Court’s 22 May 2012 judgment issued by a nine-judge panel. Relying on Rule 54(a) of CI 16, they alleged fundamental errors in the interpretation and enforcement of Articles 20(5) and 20(6) of the 1992 Constitution regarding state/public property and urged departure from Nii Kpobi Tetteh Tsuru III v Attorney-General under Articles 129(3) and 133(1). The Court reiterated that review is not a further appeal and requires proof of exceptional circumstances producing a miscarriage of justice. Applicants’ counsel confirmed he had not asked the original bench to depart from precedent and abandoned the “new evidence” ground. Date-Bah concluded that no fundamental error was shown in following the unchallenged prior decision and dismissed the application. Justice Atuguba concurred, noting applicants did not seek reversion under Article 20(6) and provided no evidence of acquisition terms; public interest under Articles 20(5)/36(8) had been considered.
R U L I N G
DR. DATE-BAH,JSC;
This is an application for a review of the judgment of this Court delivered on 22nd May 2012 by a panel of nine judges. Being a review application, the burden on the applicants is to satisfy this Court that there are, in the words of Rule 54(a) of the Supreme Court Rules, 1996 CI 16, in this case “(a) exceptional circumstances which have resulted in miscarriage of justice.” This Court has held time and time again that a review application is not an appeal and should not be argued as if it were. Accordingly, before this Court enters into the full merits of the review application, it should be satisfied that the case falls into one of the categories that existing case law has held to justify the exercise of the review jurisdiction or into a new category justifying such review, since the cases have also held that the categories justifying review are not closed.
I made a similar point in Gihoc Refrigeration & Household Products (No. 1) v Hanna Assi (No. 1) [2007-2008] SCGLR 1, where in concurring with the lead judgment (at pp. 12 – 15), I said:
“I wish, however, to add a few general comments with a view to giving further guidance to prospective applicants for review before this court. In my view, counsel before this court and their clients too lightly apply for review in circumstances which are far from exceptional. The law is clear and should really not need any further clarification by this Court.
Even if the unanimous judgment of the Supreme Court on the appeal in this case were wrong, it would not necessarily mean that the Supreme Court would be entitled to correct that error. This is an inherent incident of the finality of the judgments of the final court of appeal of the land. The brutal truth is that an error by the final court of the land cannot ordinarily be remedied by itself, subject to the exception discussed below. In other words, there is no right of appeal against a judgment of the Supreme Court, even if it is erroneous. As pithily explained by Wuaku JSC in Afranie v Quarcoo [1992] 2GLR 561 at pp. 591-592:
“There is only one Supreme Court. A review court is not an appellate court to sit in judgment over the Supreme Court.”
However, in exceptional circumstances and in relation to an exceptional category of its errors, the Supreme Court will give relief through its review jurisdiction. The grounds on which this Court will grant an application for review have been clearly laid out in the case law. Notable in