October 28, 2009
SUPREME COURT
GHANA
CORAM
AI Generated Summary
The Supreme Court of Ghana dismissed the appeal brought by Kwesi Acheampong and a co-defendant against judgments that had declared title in favor of Nana Kofi Antwi V, the gazetted Chief of Awutu Ayensuako/Osimpo, and granted related reliefs for trespass, accounts, and injunction over land at Ayensuako. The Court held that although appellants challenged the plaintiff’s capacity as a chief, the suit’s nature—declaration of title to land and trespass—remained a property dispute; mere incidence of chieftaincy issues did not convert it into a chieftaincy matter. On the merits, the Court credited documentary proof of purchase by Antwi’s ancestor (Exhibits A and B) and found defendants’ claim of joint purchase with Osimpo unproven and internally inconsistent. The Court rejected adverse possession, noting appellants were licensees and that acts since 2000 did not meet the 12-year requirement. The appeal was dismissed and the judgments of the High Court and Court of Appeal were affirmed.
J U D G M E N T
ANSAH, J.S.C.
The plaintiff sued the defendants in the High Court, Agona Swedru, for
a declaration of title and recovery of possession of a piece or parcel of land situate lying and being at a place commonly known and called Ayensuako and bounded as follows on the North by Kwa-Baa, Kobina Dadzie, Okuta and Ayensuako stream
On the North by Kojo Ahoro, Kwa-Otuo, Kwaku Bu.
On the East by Kojo Ahoro, Ofadaa lands.
On the West by Ayensu River.
¢20,000,000.00 general damages for trespass.
Order for accounts, and;
Perpetual Injunction restraining defendants and agents and assigns from interfering with plaintiff’s peaceful enjoyment of the land in dispute.
In support of his case, the plaintiff stated Nana Kofi Antwi I, also known as Ofinam, first settled on the land in dispute as a tribute paying tenant to the Duakwa Stool. In 1914 he agreed to a request by his brother Osimpo the herbalist and his children, to join him to till the land. They went to the land acknowledging Nana Antwi I as their overlord. Osimpo died in 1925 but his children remained on the land on the leave and license of Nana Kofi Antwi I.
Later in 1928, the Chief of Duakwa, Nana Amuakwa I, offered the land to Nana Kofi Antwi I for sale. Nana Kofi Antwi I accepted the offer, and the land was sold to him for #465.10. When the money was paid a receipt was issued to acknowledge payment. This was tendered at the trial as Exhibit A. The plaintiff tendered Exhibit B dated 1930 prepared to evidence the sale, to prove his assertion of the sale of the land to his predecessor in title.
The plaintiff traced the sequence of succession that when Nana Kofi Antwi I died in 1930; he was succeeded by Nana Kofi Antwi II, till it got to the turn of Nana Kofi Antwi V, the present plaintiff at the trial.
It was in 1976 when Nana Kofi Antwi II died that a faction of the Ayensuako elders enstooled one Kwaku Arhin, a grand-child of Osimpo, as the chief of Ayensuako. Ofinam’s successors brought an action at the Awutu Traditional Council seeking an order to destool Kwaku Arhin. Kwaku Arhin himself conceded that he was not a chief of Ayensuako and therefore withdrew his claim. Accordingly Nai Awulabi was enstooled as Nana Kofi Antwi IV and controlled the lands of Ofinam until he died in 1997.
In 2000, the plaintiff was enstooled as Nana Kofi Antwi V and one Akyeampong slaughtered a sheep to claim the land in dispute, for it had been jointly purchased by Ofinam and Osimpo and he had come to clai