SINO AFRICA DEVELOPMENT COMPANY LIMITED v. ROYAL BELL INVESTMENTS LIMITED & ORS

PWAMANG JSC:-

My Lords, this is an interlocutory appeal arising from a case the plaintiff/applicant/appellant/respondent (the plaintiff) filed in the High Court, Land Division, Accra on 9th August 2021 and claimed for declaration of title to a tract of land at Borteman in the Tema Municipality, recovery of possession, perpetual injunction and damages for trespass. The plaintiff’s case is, that by a sublease dated 16th August 2010 it acquired the land in dispute from the Nungua Stool represented by the Nungua Mantse and Gborbu Wulomo of Nungua. Before the sublease to the plaintiff, the Stool itself was granted a Head Lease dated 12th August 2010 covering a large tract of land including the disputed land by the Government of Ghana for a term of 99 years. The history of the land is that by Certificate of Title dated 7th March, 1940, the colonial government compulsorily acquired the land from the Nungua Stool for agricultural purposes but as at 2010 a large portion of the land was not being used by the Government so the Nungua Stool petitioned for the release of the land to it as the original owner. The Government acceded to the petition by granting the Stool the lease for 99 years of part of the acquired land.

According to the plaintiff, pursuant to the grant, it went into occupation and exercised acts of ownership by constructing its head office on the land and also put up ten (10) single-room structures at various parts of the land. Further, it built a perimeter wall around the land and the plaintiff says that all these developments were done without any let or hindrance.

By its pleadings, the plaintiff states that it was in peaceful occupation until shortly before filing this case in the High Court when the defendants/respondents/respondents/appellants (defendants) entered onto the land and started demolishing its structures. When the plaintiff confronted the defendants they claimed to have obtained judgment in their favour declaring them owners of the land and granting them an order of recovery of possession. The plaintiff says it had no prior notice of any suit concerning its land as no court process was served on it despite being in possession. However, the plaintiff later got to know that the 1st defendant brought an action in the High Court against its grantor who purported to sell part of the plaintiff’s land to it. That suit was Suit No, LD/1228/2017 but the plaintiff was not made a defendant yet the purported execution was made to affect the lan