Baafi v Abotsi (G/WJ/DG/A9/81/2023) [2025] GHADC 191 (12 February 2025)

IN THE DISTRICT COURT HELD AT WEIJA, ACCRA, ON WEDNESDAY, THE 12TH DAY OF FEBRUARY, 2025, BEFORE HER WORSHIP RUBY NTIRI OPOKU (MRS), DISTRICT MAGISTRATE SUIT NO: G/WJ/DG/A9/81/2023 MRS AKUA BAAH BAAFI PLAINTIFF VRS MR. ALFRED ABOTSI DEFENDANT PARTIES ARE PRESENT LEGAL REPRESENTATION: BRIDGET BUDU-OKYIR ESQ. HOLDING THE BRIEF OF CHARLOTTE OMANI KWAKYE-NUAKO ESQ. FOR THE PLAINTIFF WILLIAM TETTEH BOTCHWAY ESQ. HOLDING THE BRIEF OF DOE KWABENA AZIAVOR ESQ. FOR THE DEFENDANT. JUDGMENT The plaintiff applied for an order of possession of shop number E36/322 and rent arrears against the defendant at the Weija Rent Office on 8th June 2022. Both parties appeared before the Senior Rent Manager sitting at the Rent Office on 10th January 2023. The Senior Rent Manager found that the tenancy of the defendant expired on 30th June 2022 and even though he had been served with a six-month ejection notice to quit the premises by 31st December 2022, he had failed to vacate from the premises. Defendant pleaded for time to vacate from the premises and as a result the Senior Rent Manager ordered defendant to vacate the premises by 30th June 2023. On 3rd July 2023, defendant was still in occupation of the premises compelling the Senior Rent Manager to refer the matter to this court pursuant to Form 9, regulation 13 of the Rent Regulation 1946 (LI 369) for an effective order to be issued under section 17(1)(g) of the Rent Act 1963 (Act 220) to eject defendant from the premises forthwith and make such order as to costs or in connection with the proceedings. Defendant filed a defence on 22nd August 2023. Plaintiff filed a reply to defendant’s defence on 12th September 2023. 1 THE CASE OF PLAINTIFF It is the case of the plaintiff that sometime in the year 2006, she rented shop number E36/322 the subject matter of this dispute from the Ghana Industrial and Commercial Estates Limited (GICEL) to operate a business under the business name Makenzie Enterprise. It is the further case of the plaintiff that throughout the time she kept the shop, she paid rent regularly to GICEL. She added that during a period when she could not operate the shop in 2009, Emmanuel Manful a driver to her husband who was then working with GICEL approached her to let out the shop. Without notice to her, he let out the shop to the defendant whom she did not know personally. She has since then consistently asked Emmanuel Manful to eject the defendant from her shop. According to her, for the period that the defendant occupied the shop, he did not pay rent regularly for the shop either to GICEL or to her even though she had asked Emmanuel Manful to have him pay for the use of the shop to GICEL in order to prevent the accumulation of rent or debt in her business name. She averred that she was surprised when GICEL sent her a letter dated March 31, 2022 demanding an outstanding rent of GHC6,412.51 and threatening to eject her from the shop by the end of April 2022 for nonpayment of rent. Plaintiff added that upon receipt of the said letter, she proposed a settlement plan in a letter to GICEL dated 7th June 2022 to clear the outstanding debt incurred by the defendant since the year 2006. Her tenancy was subsequently renewed by GICEL from July 2022 to July 2024. 2 Plaintiff averred that considering the fact that defendant was not paying rent as he should and was unwilling to vacate from the shop, she lodged a complaint against him to the Weija Rent Control Office on 8th June 2022 to recover the shop. Upon receiving the summons from the rent control office, defendant went to GICEL behind her back and paid the outstanding debt of GHC6,412.51 to GICEL. Plaintiff says that at the Rent Control Office, parties were advised to enter into an agreement on when defendant should vacate from the shop. Subsequently, she entered into an agreement with the defendant dated 15th June 2022 giving defendant six months within which to vacate from the shop. Plaintiff stated that she gave the defendant a reminder to quit from the shop on 31st October 2022. Plaintiff says that defendant in his own petition to the Rent Control Officer against her dated 1st December 2022 entitled ‘inducing tenant to quit’ he admitted that the shop belongs to plaintiff and that he needed more time to vacate from the shop. Plaintiff added that on 3rd July 2023, the rent manager made a determination of the case and forwarded same to this court to eject defendant from the premises and make such order as to costs or in connection with the proceedings. She concluded that defendant knows that the shop belongs to her and prayed the court to eject defendant from the shop to enable her earn some income as she is currently unemployed. Plaintiff relied on the following documents attached to her witness statement to back her claim and same were admitted in evidence and marked as follows; • Certificate of registration of Makenzie Enterprise dated 1st September 1999 - Exhibit A. • Official receipts from GICEL to Makenzie Enterprise of an amount of GHC523.30 for rent paid dated 27th February 2009 - Exhibit B 3 • Customer statements of accounts for the period 1st January 2008 to 5th February 2009 and 1st January 2006 to 20th April 2007, ledger account dated 1st January 2011 to 23rd May 2022 - Exhibit C series • Demand letter from GICEL dated 31st March 2022 – Exhibit D • Letter dated 7th June 2022 proposing a settlement plan for the rent arrears with respect to shop no. E36/322 – Exhibit E • Receipts for rent paid to GICEL dated 15th June 2022 and 8th June 2022 – Exhibit F • Tenancy agreement between GICEL and Makenzie Enterprise -Exhibit G • Statements of accounts for the period 1st January 2022 to 8th June 2022, statements of accounts for the period 1st January 2023 to 29th July 2023 – Exhibit H • Plaintiff’s rent control complaints Forms 7 and 33, Agreement between Akua Baah Baafi and Alfred Abotsi, eviction reminder dated 31st October, 2022, defendant’s rent control complaints form 7 and 33 and hearing notice (form 2) and proceedings of the Rent Control Office, Weija. – Exhibit J series. Plaintiff called Mr. Emmanuel Manful as her witness. The witness corroborated the story of the plaintiff when he stated that the plaintiff Mrs. Akua Baah Baafi operated shop no. E36/322 till 2009 when she could not operate the shop any longer for personal reasons. Plaintiff and her husband subsequently made him a caretaker of the shop to collect rent from them and pay same to GICEL in the name of Makenzie Enterprise. The witness stated that sometime in 2010, he proposed to Mr. and Mrs. Baafi to rent out the shop so that the occupant can make regular payments to GICEL in order not to accumulate outstanding rent on condition that whenever Mrs. Baafi was ready to resume her business, the occupant would vacate from the shop. He testified that he put the defendant in the shop without the consent of the plaintiff and since then plaintiff has consistently told him to evict the defendant from the shop. He testified further that the defendant has at all times paid rent to GICEL in the name of Makenzie Enterprise however he informed him that he had stopped paying the rent on the advice of an association and all attempts to get him to pay rent to GICEL fell on deaf ears. He added that 4 eventually plaintiff lodged a complaint against defendant at the rent control office where he signed an agreement on 15th June 2022 to vacate the shop within a period of six months which agreement he failed or refused to honour. He concluded that shop number E36/322 belongs to plaintiff as it was assigned to her by GICEL and he dealt with defendant not as an owner of the shop but a caretaker of same. THE CASE OF THE DEFENDANT The case of the defendant is that he was approached by Emmanuel Manful who showed him shop number E36/322 and told him that the owner wanted to rent out the shop. It is the further case of the defendant that prior to that, he knew Mr. Emmanuel Manful as a driver of GICEL who told him that the owner of the shop was Mr. George Baafi, who was the then Estate Manager at GICEL. He added that Mr. Emmanuel Manful informed him that as an employee, Mr. George Baafi was not entitled or allowed to enter into a tenancy agreement with GICEL and that he should step into the shoes of Mr. George Baafi and keep making the required monthly payments in the name of Makenze Enterprise which belonged to Mr. Baafi directly to GICEL and when Mr. Baafi retires, the tenancy will be regularized in his name on condition that he gives Mr. Baafi “something” in exchange for the regularisation. According to the defendant, he was thankful to Mr. Emmanuel Manful and from time to time, he gave him gifts of clothing and accessories including various amounts of money. Defendant averred that the last time he gave Mr. Manful some money was in 2021. According to him, he operated the shop without any hinderance for 15 years between 2007 and 2022. He was only waiting for the paperwork to make him the direct tenant of GICEL. Defendant testified that sometime in 2016, nine full years after he had started using the shop, Mr. Emmanuel Manful introduced Mr. Baafi to him as his landlord. He never said anything about Mrs. Baafi. 5 Defendant testified further that sometime in 2018, the chairman of the GICEL Tenants Association advised all tenants to stop paying rent to GICEL as the matter of payment was in court. In compliance with that directive, he stopped paying all rents pending the resolution of the matter. Defendant added that in May 2022, Mr. Emmanuel Manful called him and said that there was a debt on the shop’s account at GICEL and he explained to him the reason why he had not paid his rent since 2018. Whilst making plans to raise money to pay the rent, he received a summons from rent control. The defendant stated that on the advice of Mr. Emmanuel Manful, he paid a total sum of GHC5,760 to GICEL. He tendered a copy of the receipt and same was admitted and marked as Exhibit 1. Defendant stated that he made a payment of the sum of GHC1,000.00 to GICEL after which he was summoned to GICEL where he met the plaintiff for the first time. The plaintiff offered him six months’ notice to quit the shop after which Mr. Emmanuel Manful asked him to sign an agreement with the plaintiff to that effect. Defendant says he signed the said agreement reluctantly hoping that Mr. Emmanuel Manful will speak to Mr. Baafi and remind him about his agreement with him. He added that Mr. Manful told him earlier that the plaintiff cannot take him to court because she had breached her tenancy agreement with GICEL by subletting the shop to him. He concluded by stating that Mr. Emmanuel Manful has now teamed up with the plaintiff to evict him from the shop in breach of his oral agreement with him. The court set down the following issues for determination after the close of pleadings; 1. Whether or not plaintiff is owner of the shop the subject matter of this dispute 2. Whether or not plaintiff is entitled to recovery of possession of shop number E36/322 and ejectment of the defendant? EVALUATION AND ANALYSIS OF THE LAW AND THE EVIDENCE 6 THE BURDEN OF PROOF It is trite that the burden of proof in civil cases is proof on the preponderance of probabilities. See section 12 (2) of the Evidence Act 1975 (NRCD 323). The burden of persuasion in civil cases generally lies on the party asserting a fact. Section 14 of NRCD 323 reads; “Except as otherwise provided by law, unless and until it is shifted, a party has the burden of persuasion as to each fact the existence or nonexistence of which is essential to the claim or defence he is asserting. ISSUE ONE: Whether or not plaintiff is owner of the shop the subject matter of this dispute. The plaintiff asserted that she is the owner of the shop the subject matter of this dispute. She tendered a certificate of registration of Makenzie Enterprise (Exhibit A) and the tenancy agreement between GICEL and Makenzie Enterprise (Exhibit G) as evidence of her assertion. To further buttress her claim, she produced a document which is an account statement covering shop E36/322 by GICEL dated 20th April 2007 (Exhibit C series) which showed the name “Miss Akua Baah” as the contact person for Makenzie Enterprise. Are the names Mrs Akua Baah Baafi and Miss Akua Baah referrable to the plaintiff? I find from the evidence before this court that the name Mrs Akua Baah Baafi and Miss Akua Baah, the contact person for Makenzie Enterprise refers to the plaintiff. I am fortified in this belief by the admission made by Counsel for the defendant in his address when he stated…“this account statement if it shows anything at all, shows that the defendant’s claim is more likely to be true as the name of plaintiff has been modified to exclude any reference to Mr. Baafi or conceal the fact that the plaintiff was married to Mr. Baafi in 2007”( the emphasis is mine) 7 In effect, defendant admits that the name “Miss Akua Baah” refers to the plaintiff and he asserts that the name of the plaintiff had been modified to give the notion that the shop is in the name of the plaintiff when in actual fact the shop belongs to the husband of plaintiff. Defendant insists that this is so because the husband of the plaintiff was covering up a conflict-of-interest situation. Respectfully, the assertion of the defendant which was denied by the plaintiff does not negate the fact that the name of the plaintiff is indicated in the books of GICEL as the contact person of Makenzie Enterprise. Defendant on the other hand did not lead any evidence to show that the disputed shop is in the name of Mr. Baafi, the husband of the plaintiff. Again, during the proceedings at the Rent Control Office, the defendant did not challenge the plaintiff’s ownership of the shop. In deed the defendant himself issued a complaint of inducing tenant to quit wherein he admitted that he is in occupation of a shop which belongs to the plaintiff herein. (See Exhibit J series) Indeed, during cross examination of the defendant in this court, the following information was elicited; Q: Mr. Abotsi, do you recall that you filed a matter at the Rent Control against Mrs Baafi? A: Yes, with explanation. This was after she had first served me with summons from the rent control Q: Take a look at Exhibit H of plaintiff’s witness statement. I believe that is what you filed at Rent Control that is the Form 7 A: Yes Q: When you look at Form 7 paragraph 1…Counsel reads. I hope you can see that A: Yes Q: By this statement, you have admitted that the shop belonged to the respondent in that matter who is Mrs. Baafi 8 A: Yes In his book “Essentials of the Ghana Law of Evidence” S.A. Brobbey at page 112-113 comments on importance of admissions as follows; “The importance of admissions lies in the fact that the court can act on them without proof of the facts constituting the admissions. Admissions therefore constitute the second category of matters which require no proof. The rationale for this rule is obvious. If a person admits or concedes to facts which are against his interest, there is no need to proceed further to prove those facts before he would be bound by the terms of those facts.” My understanding of the admissions made by the defendant is that the plaintiff is the owner of the shop the subject matter of this dispute. At paragraph 2 of defendant’s witness statement, he admitted that Mr. Emmanuel Manful was not the owner of the shop when he stated “I was approached by Emmanuel Manful who showed me shop no. E36/322 and he told me that he knows the owner...” I find that this statement corroborates the story of Emmanuel Manful who described himself as the caretaker of the shop and not the owner. The only conclusion to be drawn from these findings is that any agreement defendant claims to have made with Emmanuel Manful regarding the transfer of ownership to defendant whether oral or written cannot be valid as Mr. Emmanuel Manful is not the owner of the shop the subject matter of this dispute. ISSUE TWO Whether or not plaintiff is entitled to recovery of possession of shop number number E36/322 and ejectment of the defendant? Section 17(1)(a) of the Rent Act 1963, Act 220 reads as follows; 17. Recovery of possession and ejectment 9 (1) Subject to subsection (2) of section 25 and to section 28, an order against a tenant for the recovery of the possession of or for the ejectment from any premises shall not be made or given by the Rent Magistrate or any other judge of a court of competent jurisdiction in accordance with any other enactment except (a) where a rent lawfully due from the tenant has not been paid or tendered within one month after the date it became lawfully due; Defendant testified at paragraph 5 of his witness statement as follows; 5. According to him, I should step in the shoes of Mr. George Baafi and keep making the required monthly payments in the name of Makenzie Enterprise which belonged to Mr. Baafi directly to GICEL… Did the defendant make the required monthly payments in the name of Makenzie Enterprise as agreed between him and Mr. Emmanuel Manful as claimed? Certainly not! At paragraphs 14 to 16 of his witness statement defendant admitted that he has not been paying rent for the shop. His evidence is reproduced as follows; 14. Sometime in 2018, the chairman of the GICEL Tenants Association advised all tenants to stop paying rent to GICEL as the matter of payment was in court 15. In compliance with that directive I halted paying rent pending the resolution of the matter. 16. In May 2022, Mr. Emmanuel Manful called me and said that I had not been paying rent since 2018. From the evidence, it is difficult to understand why defendant who had earlier agreed to step into the shoes of the shop owner and pay rent directly to GICEL decide to stop paying rent without communicating same to the shop owner. On what basis did he become a member of GICEL Tenants Association without the authorisation of the owner of the shop especially when his name was not on any document as a tenant of GICEL? I find the story of defendant incredulous to say the least! 10 During cross examination of the defendant, the following information was elicited; Q: And so a rent amount of GHC6,412.51 accrued in respect of the property not so? A: That is not the amount. It was GHC6,760.00 and I paid GHC5,760.00. The difference of GHC1,000.00 was what I paid to Mrs. Baafi which she has admitted accepting. The question that begs for answers is why defendant quickly paid the rent arrears contrary to the alleged directives given by the GICEL Tenants Association? The answer is not farfetched, indeed, Defendant admitted under cross examination that he only paid the rent after the summons from the rent control was served on him as follows; Q: Mr Abotsi, you paid GHC5,760.00 to GICEL is that not so? A: Yes plus the additional GHC1,000.00 Q; And this was after plaintiff had reported you to the Rent Control not so? A: Yes. It was after Mr. Emmanuel Manful who said I should pay the money to GICEL I find from the evidence that even though defendant was required to pay rent monthly to GICEL, he had failed to do so for three years and only paid when he was served with summons from the rent control office. Apart from the payments of rent to GICEL as evidenced by Exhibit 1 series, defendant has not provided any evidence to show that after Exhibit 1 series, he has made regular monthly payments of rent to GICEL on behalf of Makenzie Enterprise to date. Applying the law cited supra to the totality of the evidence before me, I find the story of the plaintiff to be more probable than that of the defendant. Judgment is accordingly entered in favour of the plaintiff against the defendant as follows; 1. Plaintiff is the owner of the shop the subject matter of this dispute and is entitled to recover possession of the shop from the defendant. 11 2. Defendant is ordered to vacate from the shop, the subject matter of this dispute forthwith and yield up vacant possession to the plaintiff. 3. Defendant is ordered to pay all outstanding rent arrears including the sums paid as rent by the plaintiff if any on production of receipts evidencing such payments. 4. Defendant is ordered to pay outstanding utility bills if any prior to vacating from the premises. 5. Costs of GHC30,000.00 is awarded in favour of the plaintiff against the defendant. ……………(SGD)………………………… H/W RUBY NTIRI OPOKU (MRS.) DISTRICT MAGISTRATE 12