On 22 March 1959 an appeal from the judgment of the Cape Coast Municipal Court was filed at the Lands Court of the Cen\Ta\ ~UQ1C1a\ Div1s10n. The case was titled: Aba Donkoh & Or v Joseph Adzinyina Duncan. In a consent judgment, the parties agreed that HINo B8212 Intsin St, Cape Coast was jointly owned by the families of both parties. It was further agreed by the parties that the family of the plaintiff-respondent should occupy the ground floor of the building while the family of the defendant - appellant occupy the top floor of the house, and that the second defendant-appellant, Aabah, was to have the use of room No 4 during her lifetime, with a reversion to the family of the plaintiff. Each family was to bear payment of rates in respect of the portions of the house given to them in the judgment. And in the event of the house falling into ruins, the land was to go to the family of the plaintiff.
On 3 October 1995, pursuant to leave granted by the High Court, Cape Coast, the respondent filed an application praying the court for an order to attach the appellant who was alleged to have flouted the orders in the consent judgment. It was the complaint of the respondent that the appellant had in spite of the terms of the judgment, broken the lock placed on the door to one o(the rooms on the ground floor and given the room to a brother to live in. Again, in August 1995 the appellant forcibly ejected a tenant of the respondent from a room on the ground floor and gave the room to his relation called Adjoa Ano to occupy. By these acts of the appellant, the respondent claimed that he had committed contempt of court. The appellant in this appeal is a grandson of the defendant-appellant in the 1959 appeal at the Lands Court, Cape Coast.
On 30 July 1997 the appellant was found guilty of contempt by the High Court, Cape Coast and was ordered to pay ¢ 15,000 as compensation to the respondent for the lock he broke and was also bonded in the sum of ¢500,000 for a period of 24 months. It is against this conviction and sentence that he appealed to the Court of Appeal. In compliance with the rules, counsel for the parties duly filed their written submissions.
Mr EVA Adjetey, counsel for the appellant, canvassed several grounds in his written submission. First, he submitted that the application for the order of contempt was irregular inasmuch as it was merely captioned: "Motion' on notice." He contended that the proper formulation of the application ought to have been.
