[1975]DLCA9275 • March 3, 1975 • Court of Appeal
AFRIFA vs. CLASS-PETER
The appellant, a businessman, and the respondent, a school teacher, entered into a relationship culminating in a promise to marry under the Christian monogamic concept. The appellant sent gifts to the respondent's family and cohabited with her. Despite four postponements of the marriage ceremony by the appellant, the respondent waited and abandoned her teaching career. The appellant engaged in multiple indiscretions, including fathering a child with another woman and being caught in an embrace with another woman, leading the respondent to leave the home and commence proceedings for breach of promise to marry.
read moreJUDGMENT OF FRANCOIS J.A. This is an appeal from the decision of the Circuit Court, Accra, whereby the appellant was condemned in damages in the sum of ¢2,000.00 for breach of his promise to marry the respondent. The facts may be shortly stated. The respondent is a school teacher and the appellant a businessman. After an initial attraction for each other they exchanged vows to seal their relationship in marriage. The appellant appears to have been the prime mover in this attempt to regulate their relationship into something of permanence. To this end, he sent to the family of the respondent, gifts of money, drinks, a ring and a Bible. There is no denial that thereafter the respondent allowed herself to be seduced by the appellant. The couple later set up a home and cohabited together. The respondent abandoned her avocation as a teacher of domestic science and waited expectantly for the joyful day. There were four postponements of the marriage ceremony, all at the instance of the a....