2019
COURT OF APPEAL
GHANA
CORAM
AI Generated Summary
This Ghana Court of Appeal decision arises from a land dispute at Modrekenle near Princess Town in the Western Region. The Plaintiffs, a Ghanaian couple resident in the United States, claimed two parcels they said they acquired from Nana Fabin Amantwe III of the Egyambra divisional stool after archival searches revealed issues with an earlier interaction with Modrekenle Odikro Nana Toku III. The 1st Defendant, however, had registered leases in 1999 based on his 1998 acquisition from Nana Toku III, and had undertaken acts of possession and development. The 3rd Defendant maintained Modrekenle lands are under the Modrekenle stool within Princess Town; the 4th Defendant, the Egyambra chief, asserted Modrekenle forms part of Egyambra stool lands and relied on archival and internal stool documents. On appeal and cross-appeal, the Court found Plaintiffs’ evidence internally inconsistent and their core lease defective and unregistered, rejected archival concessions as irrelevant, accepted a historical treatise placing Modrekenle under Princess Town, held the 4th Defendant had acquiesced, and affirmed the High Court’s judgment for the 1st and 3rd Defendants, dismissing both appeals and upholding an injunction against the 4th Defendant.
LAWRENCE L. MENSAH, J.A.
This is an appeal against the judgment of the High Court, Sekondi dated 31st July 2017. The appeal is launched by the Plaintiffs/Appellants who will be referred to as the Plaintiffs against whom the judgment was entered in favour of the 1st and 3rd Defendants/Respondents who will be referred in this judgment as 1st and 3rd Defendants. There is also a cross-appeal by the 4th Defendant/Appellant against the said judgment and he will be referred to in this judgment simply as the 4th Defendant.
FACTS:
This is a comparatively huge land appeal with several amendments of the parties. Because the parties are many and have different interests in the disputed land, the facts of the case has to be isolated so as to clear the twists and turns of the case. What this means is that the facts of each party’s case will be given and which are briefly as follows: The Plaintiffs who are a Ghanaian married couple are ordinarily resident in the United States of America. The 1st Plaintiff from his own evidence comes from Princess Town, a town situate between Takoradi and Ahanta West District of the Western Region. Princess Town is the area around which the disputed land is situate specifically at Modrekenle.
According to the 1st Plaintiff who also testified for the 2nd Plaintiff his wife aforesaid, he jointly acquired the disputed land in 2003 from Nana Fabin Amantwe III of the royal Majolley family of Egyambra for valuable consideration. The 1st Plaintiff said he first contacted the 3rd Defendant who created the impression that he was the owner of the disputed land. He paid an initial amount to Nana Toku III the predecessor of the current 3rd Defendant. However, upon a search at the National Archives, they Plaintiffs discovered that the disputed land was not after all for the 3rd Defendant. They therefore abandoned dealing with the 3rd Defendant. This is because certain archival documents from the National Archives proved that the disputed land was owned by the 4th Defendant’s Stool. They therefore got the necessary documentation for the disputed land from Nana Fabian Amantwe III aforesaid. It is to be mentioned that the Amantwe stool is a rival stool to the Amoo stool at Egyambra, a divisional town within the Ahanta West District.
The further case of the Plaintiffs is that their land consisted of two pieces of which the first one is 19.61 acres surrounded by the sea except when there is a high tide. The second land is 256.60 acres. Both properties