When a feuding faction in the Bortinor chieftaincy row stormed the office of the Director General, CID’s office yesterday, they were not going to answer questions like litigants who were under investigation by the security agency.
They were, with their voluminous relevant documents and petition, going to explain to the CID boss that the injunction order, dated 6th May, 1993, by the Judicial Committee of the Ga Traditional Council, which was upheld by an Accra High Court on the 24th June, 2014, must be respected by the investigators and the crime officers, because it supersedes all judgment delivered by any court of the land, which recognizes anybody in Bortianor as chief or acting chief during the pendency of the case.
The elders said it is only the Traditional Council that has the authority to say who a chief is and not a court.
They alleged that despite the case being with Judicial Committee, two persons are styling themselves as Bortianor Mantse, one as Acting Bortianor Mantse and are selling Bortianor stool lands, whilst their capacities are not recognized by the Ga Traditional Council because the Judicial Committee in their wisdom ordered against those capacities in May, 1993 in a case entitled NiiKweiArku IV versus Sackeytse Aflah and others.
Among the documents presented to the CID boss included the ruling of the High Court, the order of injunction by the Ga Traditional Council, Communication between Lands Commission and the elders, a writ of summons against Lands Commission, letter from the Greater Accra Regional House of Chiefs and National House of Chiefs, indicating the pendency of the Bortianor chieftaincy dispute, appointment of a solicitor for the stool, publication in the daily paper warning the public of sale of Bortianor lands in an illegal capacity as far back as 1997, and copies of indentures signed by the three self-styled chiefs.
The case of the elders was that Nii KweiArku IV, who vested Bortianor lands into the Bortianor stool in 1977, said he was the Mantse of Bortianor and lawful representative of the Bortianor stool.
The land described in the schedule hereto delineated on the plan hereto attached and thereon shown edge pink is the property of the Bortianor stool and can be validly alienated only by the occupant of the Bortianor stool at any particular time acting together with his elders and councilors, and that was the same capacity the Judicial Committee prohibited persons from putting themselves into until the final determination of the chieftaincy dispute.
To the elders anybody claiming to be chief of Bortianor is an imposter and this is what they claim some police are refusing to understand. According to the elders, the stool is vacant and the injunction was pending, and that Bortianor lands could have been granted since 1993, therefore, those who dealt with Bortianor Stool lands did it with the intention to deprive the Bortianor stool and its subjects their right of ownership, interest, value or the proceed which they say amounted to stealing.
The Elders told the CID boss that the police should rather arrest those in possession of the indentures in the none-existing capacity and not to protect those indentures as it is being seen now.
The elders explained that it is the attitude of some of the police that is resulting in all the problems in Bortianor. They gave an instant where a police officer, after reading all the documents they submitted which proved the fraudulent nature of how Bortianor lands were granted decided to charge the elders for trespassing when the document of the person the police officer was protecting should have been executed by a government institution if indeed that government institution even had land in Bortianor.
They told the CID boss to kindly advice his men to stop bringing the authority of the rulings into disregard, disrepute and stop prejudicing the public from respecting the rulings, when the rulings which declared the Bortianor stool vacant together with the injunction order had been forwarded to the Legal Department of the Police Service and the Attorney General’s Department.
The elders told the CID Boss that they would not hesitate to report to him any police officer who would interfere with the order.
The injunction order is produce below:
i. The plaintiff NiiKweiArku IV and the 5th defendant, Nii KometeyTettey, as well as their agents are hereby restrained from acting or purporting to act in any manner whatsoever as mantse of Bortianor until the final determination of the substantive suit now before us.
ii. It is further ordered that the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th defendants are restrained from taking steps to nominate, elect, install, enstool or outdoor the 5th defendant as Mantse of Bortianor until the final determination of substantive matter before us.
iii. We further order that during the pendency of this suit no person shall do any act that may occasion the breach of the peace in Bortianor.
The Police will be informed accordingly. No order as to costs. Case adjourned to 27th May, 1993 for hearing of the main suit.
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