SUPREME COURT, ACCRA
DATE: 12TH NOVEMBER, 1962
BEFORE: OLLENNU, J.S.C., SARKODEE-ADOO and MILLS-ODOI, JJ.S.C.
It is provided by regulation 69 of the Local Courts Procedure Regulations, 1959 that: “69. The Local Court shall consider whether a plea made under Regulation 68 is made out and give its decision which shall be written in the Record Book. If the Local Court is satisfied that the plea has been made out, the suit must be dismissed or the accused discharged, as the case may be. If the Local Court is not satisfied that the plea has been made out, it shall order the defendant or the accused (as the case may be) to plead in the ordinary way under Regulation 65, or that the hearing shall continue.”
In this case, the local court magistrate was not satisfied that the plea of res judicata was made out, and as to the plea of jurisdiction, he held that the plea was an attempt to raise in his court a boundary dispute between the stools of Offinso and Techiman; that, he felt, he should not encourage. He, therefore, ordered the trial to proceed and it proceeded accordingly on the merits to conclusion.
However, in his judgment on the whole case, he came to the conclusion that the plea of res judicata had been made out; he thereupon dismissed the plaintiff’s claim and entered judgment for the defendant.
[p.122] of [1962] 2 GLR 121
A ruling by a local court under regulation 69 that a plea of res judicata or absence of jurisdiction has not been made out, is not a final decision on the said plea; all it amounts to is, that at the stage where the ruling was made, there was not sufficient evidence before the local court to justify a ruling that the plea had been made out. It is therefore still open to the party raising the point to lead evidence in the course of the trial on the merits to assist the court to come to a definite decision on the plea at the conclusion of the whole case. If at the close of the trial the court should be satisfied that the plea had eventually been made out, it would be perfectly entitled to uphold the plea, notwithstanding its former ruling. Therefore in this case, the Techiman Local Court was well within its powers in holding that the claim was res judicata, provided its said findings can be supported by the evidence before it.
DECISION
(Duah v. Beng. Judgment delivered by Ollennu, J.S.C., Sarkodee-Adoo and Mills-Odoi, JJ.S.C.concurring.)
