Achimota SHS wins 7-year land encroachment case

The encroachers had dragged the school to court after the latter had warned of the imminent threats to its students and the future of the school through activities of the encroachers.

Giving judgment on the 7-year land litigation, the Judge, Justice Aduamah Osei comprehensively dismissed the claims brought by Netlynk and 66 others against the School and instead upheld the School’s counterclaims. The court found that:

The properties of Netlynk and the others are on the School’s land.

The Oku We and the Owoo families had no title to the areas encroached on and had no right to grant leases of land to other people.

Netlynk and the others were not bona fide buyers and were reckless in acquiring their respective purported grants from the Oku We and Owoo families; Netlynk and the others have trespassed onto the School’s land.

The School is entitled to repossess its land and to damages for the destruction caused to the School’s properties including the farm and sewage system.

Background to the land litigation

The Old students of Achimota Senior High School are in court to seek an injunction to stop the work of developers who have encroached the school’s land.

For several years, some parts of the 172-acre land belonging to Achimota High School have been taken over by land guards and developers who are putting up structures without permits which is threatening the very existence of the schools.

Several efforts to get them evacuate the land has proven futile since most Land guards claim they are the owners of the land and in some instances have threatened staff occupying school bungalows to vacate.

The school’s lands were acquired by ordinance by the colonial government from the Osu Stool in 1921 and an amount of 4,000 pounds paid to the elders of the stool.

But a protracted land litigation became murkier when the Osu Mankralo stool and a few elders went to court and averred that more than 170 acres of the land were not being used for the purpose for which the colonial government acquired it.

Therefore, the Osu Mankralo stool wants it reverted to the original owners.

The court then ruled in favour of the Osu Mankralo stool and his team and handed the land back to them.

But members of Old Achimotan Association (OAA) are against reverting the school’s land to the Osu Mankralo stool, so they went back to court to seek an injunction to stop encroachers from developing on the land.

The court reserved judgement on the question of which of the 67 encroachers will be liable to pay damages for the destruction and to have their property repossessed by the School.

The court ordered lawyers to file legal arguments on this question by July 4, 2017, and for final orders in that respect to be made on July 17, 2017.