The Owerri North Housing Estates Limited (now called UMUORII RAINBOW ESTATES LIMITED) is the root of title for all plots of the Estate. This has long been established by many judicial decisions and pronouncements of both Owerri High Court and the Court of Appeal. Some of the important cases are listed below to enable interested purchasers of our plots to exercise their diligence.
CASE 1: OWERRI HIGH COURT SUIT NO. HOW/320/2006: SIMEON ENWERE & ORS VS. OWERRI NORTH LOCAL GOVERNMENT COUNCIL & ORS.
In this first court litigation over ownership of the land, the plaintiffs were the original landowners from whom the land was acquired by Imo State Government in 1990, and the suit was determined by the then Chief Judge of Imo State Hon. Justice P.C. Onumajulu on 10th July 2007.
The plaintiffs’ cause of action was that after compulsorily acquiring the land for PUBLIC BUILDINGS (Former Owerri Local Government Headquarters and other State uses) in 1990, the Imo State Government changed the purpose cause in 2016 to RESIDENTIAL DEVELOPMENT (Housing Estate). The original landowners then took the view that they were entitled to reversion of ownership of the land once the original purpose of acquisition had failed. The original landowners therefore sued, praying the High Court to set aside the compulsory acquisition and return ownership of the land to them.
On the part of the defendants in the action, their case in court was that the instruments of government compulsory acquisition of the project land were clear that the acquisition was not just for the purpose of Former Owerri Local Government Headquarters, but also for other state uses, and that residential development targetted to help solve acute accommodation problems of the State was an acceptable state use of the land, whether or not the project was being implemented through public or private developers mandated by Government. It was also the case of the defendants that compensation had been duly paid to the original landowners in full satisfaction of the obligations placed on Government by the Land Use Act. It was further the case of the defendants that the original landowners accepted their compensation in 1990 without any complaint, and that was even long before Government took possession of the land, cleared and fenced the land, and then commenced physical development of the land with many structures already built up before the action was brought against Government in 2006.
In the Judgment, which was a consent judgment, the court approved that the land be parcellated and leased out to developers for the purpose of ultra modern residential and commercial housing estate called UMUORII RAINBOW ESTATE. The Judgment also approved that OWERRI NORTH HOUSING ESTATES LIMITED be incorporated and established as vehicle for ensuring hitch free execution of the project. The Judgment allocated 25 compensatory plots of the land to the original landowners and their attorneys and facilitators, and finally vested the rights of occupancy of the land on OWERRI NORTH HOUSING ESTATES LIMITED, thereby tacitly foreclosing Owerri North Local Government from laying any future claims to title to the land.
There was no appeal against the Judgment and it stands till date as the root of title of NORTH HOUSING ESTATES LIMITED in the public records.
It is confirmed that the Imo State Government implemented the Judgement and filed it as No. 9 at Page 9 in Volume 1161 of the Lands Registry at Owerri. And by a letter to The Managing Consultant, Owerri North Housing Estates Limited, Reference No. IMDR 9555/50 the Ministry of Lands, Survey & Physical Development clarified that the filed judgment supersedes any other previous registration on the same land in the public records of Imo State.
CASE 2: OWERRI HIGH COURT SUIT NO. HOW/464/2010: MIKE OGUOMA & ORS VS OWERRI NORTH LOCAL GOVERNMENT COUNCIL & ORS.
This second litigation for ownership of the land was instituted and prosecuted by politicians of the original landowners community (Umuorri), and the principal figure among them was Chief Amobi Uwaleke who was signing as “Umuorii Leader”.
In the suit, the plaintiffs sought orders of the High Court setting aside the Judgment in Suit No. HOW/320/2006 which was given four years earlier by Hon. Justice P.C. Onumajulu (Chief Judge). The plaintiffs also asked the High Court to set aside the the compulsory acquisition of their land done by Government in 1990, which was more than the ten year limitation period earlier. The plaintiffs also attacked the devolution of the land from IMO STATE GOVERNMENT to OWERRI NORTH HOUSING ESTATES LIMITED and asked the court to set is aside.
But in his Judgment given on 12th June 2012, Hon. Justice B.A. Njemanze, Chief Judge, held that the principal Judgment of Hon. Justice P.C. Onumajulu in Suit No. HOW/320/2006 given on 10th July 2007 was still valid and subsisting, and that the fresh action brought on behalf of the same original landowners who were the plaintiffs in Suit No. HOW/320/2006, constituted abuse of the court’s process. The court also held that there must be and end to litigation, and so the original landowners ought not to have sued again on the subject matter.
There was also no appeal against the judgment, and the Imo State Government relied on it to foreclose any further or future challenge of the project by the original landowners. The Judgment was finally filed at No. 11 at page 11 in Volume 1161 of the Lands Registry at Owerri.
CASE 3: OWERRI HIGH COURT SUIT NO. HOW/163/2011: MIKE OGUOMA & ORS VS OWERRI NORTH LOCAL GOVERNMENT COUNCIL & ORS
The same plaintiffs who filed Suit No. HOW/464/2010 in Year 2010 and was already prosecuting it midway filed this second suit of theirs on the same subject matter and against the same set of defendants.
On 11th July 2012, the same trial Judge hearing Suit No. HOW/464/2010, Hon. Justice B.A. Njemanze, heard the preliminary objection brought by the defendants and struck out the suit for being incompetent.
CASE 4: OWERRI HIGH COURT SUIT NO. HOW/597/2011: MIKE OGUOMA & ORS VS OWERRI NORTH LOCAL GOVERNMENT COUNCIL & ORS
The same plaintiffs who filed and prosecuted Suit Nos. HOW/464/2010 and HOW/163/2011 took out this suit as their third litigation on the same subject matter and against the same set of defendants.
In his judgment given on 20th June 2017, Hon. Justice N.B. Ukoha dismissed the suit for being gross abuse of the court’s process, reasoning that the plaintiffs who claimed to be representing the original landowners ought to have appealed against the earlier judgments in Suit No. HOW/320/2006 or the later decision in Suit No. HOW/464/2010, instead of bringing yet another fresh action on the same subject matter and against the same set of defendants.
The court finally barred the original landowners from re-litigating on the land in any court of law.
CASE 5: OWERRI HIGH COURT SUIT NO. HOW/583/2018: OWERRI NORTH HOUSING ESTATES LIMITED & ORS VS OCCUPIERS OF PLOT P.10 EGBU/URATTA LAYOUT OWERRI.
This case here has a different type of cause from all the earlier ones. The plaintiffs were not the original owners of the land as in Suit Nos. HOW/464/2010, HOW163/2011 and HOW/597/2011, but plaintiffs were the successful defendants in those earlier suits who needed to recover possession of the land forcefully taken away from them while the earlier suits were pending in different High Courts. On the other hand, the defendants in the action were the trespassers who entered and started occupying the land relying on papers purportedly b issued to them by Chief Amobi Uwaleke and group as well as papers fabricated in the name of Owerri North Local Government to claim an interest in the land.
In his Judgment given on 6th September 2018, the trial Judge, Hon. Justice B.C. Iheka granted possession of the land to OWERRI NORTH HOUSING ESTATES LIMITED and awarded costs against the trespassers.
There was no appeal against the Judgment, and on 18th December 2019 the Judgment was executed by the bailiffs of Owerri High Court.
CASE 6: CONTEMPT PROCEEDINGS OWERRI HIGH COURT NO. HOW/290M/2019: OWERRI NORTH HOUSING ESTATES LIMITED VS CHIEF AMOBI UWALEKE & 6 ORS.
Following the Owerri High Court bailliff’s execution of the writ of possession granted by the High Court to OWERRI NORTH HOUSING ESTATES LIMITED, six members of the controversial but now desperate Chief Amobi Uwaleke group and their leader took their luck further and tried to retake possession of the project land by force. They were dragged to the High Court in contempt proceedings marked as SUIT NO. HOW/290M/2019.
On 14th October 2021, the seven persons so taken to court, including Chief Amobi Uwaleke, were convicted by the High Court for contempt of the principal subsisting High Court in Suit No. HOW/320/2006 aforementioned. The trial court also directed them to refund all monies they wrongly demanded and received from their victims to sell plots of the Estate to them without title.
On 15th October 2021, the adjudged contemnors reacted to their conviction by filing an appeal, but curiously not against their conviction for contempt but principally against the order of the trial court directing them to refund moneys wrongly demanded and received from their victims.
The purported appeal was dead on arrival at the Court of Appeal as the appellants neither sought for nor obtain leave of the trial court to appeal on grounds of mixed law and fact as statutorily required. The respondents challenged the competence of the appeal in processes filed at the Court of Appeal, and the application for dismissal of the appeal is yet to be heard.
CASE 7: COURT OF APPEAL CASE NO. CA/OW/515/2018:MIKE OGUOMA & ORS VS OWERRI NORTH LOCAL GOVERNMENT COUNCIL & ORS.
The unsuccessful plaintiffs at the High Court in Suit No. HOW/597/2011 led by Chief Amobi Uwaleke initiated the appeal with their Notice of Appeal filed on 28th June 2017.
The Judgment in Suit No. HOW/597/2012 being challenged in the appeal had merely barred the appellants from litigating again on the subject land in any court of law. The appellants were apparently claiming they have the legal right to continuing even after suing and losing to the respondents in three different litigations on the same set of facts.
The said appeal lingered until 1st February 2023 when the Court of Appeal heard it and dismissed it.
The most important part of the Court of Appeal decision was that the court expunged the APPEAL CASE NO. CA/OW/515/2018 from all records of the Court of Appeal, thereby foreclosing any further appeal the appellants would have otherwise been entitled to make to the Supreme Court.
CASE 8: ENFORCEMENT ACTION SUIT NO. HOW/726/2019:OWERRI NORTH HOUSING ESTATES LIMITED VS OWERRI NORTH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
This enforcement action was taken out to resolve questions between OWERRI NORTH LOCAL GOVERNMENT and OWERRI NORTH HOUSING ESTATES LIMITED as to where title to the land legally resided.
Hon. Justice E.F. Njemanze who heard and determined the matter on 30th July 2019 decided it in favour of OWERRI NORTH HOUSING ESTATES LIMITED. The court proceeded and granted leave to the Statutory Certificate of Occupancy of the land to OWERRI NORTH HOUSOING ESTATES LIMITED.
The court also granted a perpetual injunction restraining OWERRI NORTH LOCAL GOVERNMENT and its officials, workmen, agents, privies and their collaborating government Ministries and parastatals, etc, from doing any act or thing which is capable of undermining the right of occupancy secured by the earlier Judgment of Hon. Justice P C Onumajulu in Suit No. HOW/320/2006 for OWERRI NORTH HOUSING ESTATES LIMITED.
The orders so made by the court effectively stopped land thieves who were at the time desperately and criminally attempting to use the name of Owerri North Local Government to do fraudulent transactions with the land with their victims.
CASES 9 AND 10: ENFORCEMENT ORDERS OF OWERRI HIGH COURT IN SUIT NOS. HOW/583/2018 AND HOW/85M/2023.
In reaction to continuing efforts by land thieves to occupy the land through victims who were not bothered that land thieves who were purportedly selling plots of the Estate to them had no title, OWERRI NORTH HOUSING ESTATES LIMITED approached the Owerri High Court for enforcement orders of court capable of dealing with the problem.
On 16th September 2019, the High Court presided over by Hon. Justice T.E. Chujwuemeka-Chikeka enforced the earlier Judgment of Hon. Justice B C. Iheka in Suit No. HOW/583/2018 granting possession of the land to OWERRI NORTH HOUSING ESTATES LIMITED.
One of the important orders made by the court on 16th September 2019 was that all structures built on the land by the trespassers were forfeited to the title holder i.e. OWERRI NORTH HOUSING ESTATES LIMITED.
On 27th June 2023, additional orders were granted by the same court ordering the Owerri Capital Development Authority (OCDA) which is statutorily charged with responsibility for developmental control in Owerri to demolish all the structures that were built illegally in the Estate by trespassers.
The court further ordered security agencies in Imo State to arrest and prosecute any person who has continued to occupy the land in contempt of the subsisting orders of court.
CASES II AND 12: FEDERAL HIGH COURT SUIS NOS. FHC/OW/CS/167/2008 AND FHC/OW/CS/85/2016.
Apart from the above-listed decisions of Owerri High Court backing OWERRI NORTH HOUSING ESTATES LIMITED as the Estate title holder, the Federal High Court also adjudicated over disputes between Owerri Local Government and Antioch American Investment Company Limited who were the initial promoters.
The first was in Suit No. FHC/OW/CS/167/2008 which ended in a judgment backing the initial promoters and the second was in Suit No. FHC/OW/CS/85/2016 which was subsequently compromised by the parties.
The Federal High Court judgment in Suit No. FHC/OW/CS/167/2008 given on 21st January 2010 entrusted the project on Antioch American Investment Company Limited to implement, the reason the company has continued the project till this day.
FACTS DEDUCIBLE FROM THE FOREGOING:
All important litigations challenging or touching on title to the project land have been presented above.
There is no pending appeal challenging the ownership and possession of the project land by OWERRI NORTH HOUSING ESTATES LIMITED.
It can, therefore, be safely concluded by everyone that purchasers of the plots of UMUORII RAINBOW ESTATE get good title from OWERRI NORTH HOUSING ESTATES LIMITED, and from no other legal person or entity, whether public or private.
Certified true copies of any High Court or Court of Appeal judgment or order mentioned or referred to anywhere on this information website can be obtained through us from the affected courts registry, and at a fee of $20, and by sending the request email to: legal@owerrinorthhousingestates.com