Panic hit a section of the populace when media carried reports about the Supreme Court’s ruling on some 72,000 acres of land within and around the Greater Accra Region. According to the reports, a five-member panel of the apex court presided over by the Chief Justice, Justice Gertrude Araba Esaaba Torkornoo, affirmed that the Numo Nmashie Family of Teshie were not the rightful owners of these lands because a Court of Appeal’s decision in 1982 which declared them owners of the piece of land was based on fraudulent information presented to the court.
The court, therefore, directed the Lands Commission to expunge all registration and certificates issued to the Numo Nmashie Family of Teshie, and the Tetteh Olewolon Family, in respect of the 72,000 acres.
The court also directed that all third parties in possession and deriving title through the Numo Nmashie Family prior to the latest Supreme Court judgment were to attorn tenancy to the Boi Stool and relevant families.
The villages affected by the decision are Peduase, Danfa, Oyarifa, La- Bawaleshie Madina, Ashale-Botwe, Adenta, Teshie and other 60 more communities.
WHAT IS THE IMPACT OF THE RULING ON LAND AND PROPERTY OWNERSHIP?
In a conversation with a legal practitioner, Emmanuel Mate-Kole Esq. he explained that, despite the court’s decision which states that current land owners in these areas must not be dispossessed of their land, their land registration records linked to that of the Numo Nmashie family have all been instructed to be wiped out of the records of the Lands Commission.
“Once it has been established that the judgement made was fraudulent, and consequently the registration that they made was more or less a mistake, every fruit that is born out of that bad tree, is also bad automatically”, he stated.
Thus all persons who own land within these 70 communities will have their registration records wiped out in entirety, as they put efforts in regaining their land from the new rightful owners.
Watch the full conversation as Lawyer Mate-Kole expounds more on the situation, breaking down further what you ought to do if you own lands within any of these communities.
Watch the full conversation here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLyp_zMFGWU&t=126s
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