May 12, 2022
COURT OF APPEAL
GHANA
CORAM
AI Generated Summary
In this Ghana Court of Appeal decision authored by Justice Margaret Welbourne, Junchen Enterprise Limited appealed against a High Court ruling dismissing its contempt application. Junchen had sued Amma Fosua and, under a preservation order, its large stock of footwear (thousands of packages) was stored in a warehouse arranged by a licensed auctioneer (1st Respondent) with the warehouse owner (2nd), two security men (3rd and 4th), and a tenant (5th) involved. Following a variation order and supervised releases, only 4,399 packages were recovered out of an overall count of 5,392, leaving a shortfall of 933. Alleging concerted interference and theft by the Respondents, Junchen sought their committal for contempt. The High Court found compliance with court orders and noted police investigations had not fixed theft on anyone. On appeal, the Court of Appeal held that contempt requires proof beyond reasonable doubt of willful disobedience of clear orders. Circumstantial evidence did not meet this standard. The appeal was dismissed and costs awarded.
WELBOURNE, J.A
This is an appeal from the judgment of the High Court dated 16th July 2020 on the subject matter of contempt of court. The main issue in this matter is whether or not the Respondents are liable to be committed for contempt of the trial court and its orders.
Black Law Dictionary 7th Edition defines contempt as:
1. The act or state of despising, condition of being despised.
2. Conduct that defies the authority or dignity of a court or legislature.
Contempt of court means any conduct that interferes with or undermines the administration of justice. The Supreme Court defines contempt of court as following in the Republic vrs High Court, Accra Ex-parte Laryea Mensah [1998-99] SCGLR, 360:
“By definition, a person commits contempt and may be committed to prison for willfully disobeying an order of court requiring him to do any act other than the payment of money or abstain from doing same act, and the order sought to be enforced should be unambiguous and must be clearly understood by the parties concerned.”
The Background
This is an application brought under Order 50 of the High Court (Civil Procedure) Rules C.I. 47, seeking an Order of Committal for Contempt against the Respondents. The grounds for the Application had been deposed to in an affidavit by one Yan Feng as follows: That the 1st Respondent is a Licensed Auctioneer of the High, court Commercial Division, 2nd Respondent is the owner of unnumbered warehouse situate at North Kaneshie, Industrial area, 3rd and 4th Respondents are the security men of the said warehouse, whilst 5th Respondent is a tenant of the said warehouse where the preserved goods were kept. According to Applicant, Junchen Enterprise Limited, it commenced an action against one Amma fosua, the Defendant in Suit No CM/RPS/0172/2018, Junchen Enterprise Ltd. vrs Amma Fosua, for the recovery of an amount of GHȼ283,826.00 owed to Applicant.
The Defendant filed a Statement of Defence and Counterclaimed for an amount of GHȼ2,268.00 as commission based on an alleged oral agreement with the Applicant, and another GHȼ259,000.00 for loss of earnings. That the Defendant applied to court for preservation of goods belonging to the Applicant, and same was granted pursuant to which the 1st Respondent seized 5,329 packages load of Applicants goods, which are footwear in sacks and cartons, and caused them to be kept in a warehouse belonging to the 2nd Respondent on the 13th day of March, 2019.
Applicant averred that he applied