REPUBLIC vs. DIRECTOR OF PRISONS; EX PARTE SIPA-YANKEY AND OTHERS [2003]DLHC1014

Date	2003-05-27
Suit No.
Citation No.	[2003]DLHC1014

APPAU J

TONY LITHUR FOR THE FIRST APPLICANT.

SAMUEL CODJOE FOR THE SECOND APPLICANT.

DAVID KUDOADZI FOR THE THIRD APPLICANT.

[2003]DLHC1014
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													<main id="main" class="content" style="min-height: 60rem" ><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:&quot;Book Antiqua&quot;,&quot;serif&quot;;
mso-fareast-font-family:&quot;Book Antiqua&quot;;mso-bidi-font-family:&quot;Book Antiqua&quot;;
color:#00B0F0">REPUBLIC<o:p></o:p><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:&quot;Book Antiqua&quot;,&quot;serif&quot;;
mso-fareast-font-family:&quot;Book Antiqua&quot;;mso-bidi-font-family:&quot;Book Antiqua&quot;;
color:#00B0F0">vs.<o:p></o:p><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:&quot;Book Antiqua&quot;,&quot;serif&quot;;
mso-fareast-font-family:&quot;Book Antiqua&quot;;mso-bidi-font-family:&quot;Book Antiqua&quot;;
color:#00B0F0">DIRECTOR OF PRISONS; EX PARTE SIPA-YANKEY AND OTHERS<o:p></o:p>[HIGH
COURT, ACCRA]<o:p></o:p>[2003-2005]
1 GLR 259<o:p></o:p><div style="mso-element:para-border-div;border:none;border-bottom:solid windowtext 1.5pt;
padding:0in 0in 1.0pt 0in">

</div>COUNSEL:<o:p></o:p>TONY
LITHUR FOR THE FIRST APPLICANT.<o:p></o:p>SAMUEL
CODJOE FOR THE SECOND APPLICANT.<o:p></o:p><div style="mso-element:para-border-div;border:none;border-bottom:solid windowtext 1.5pt;
padding:0in 0in 1.0pt 0in">

DAVID
KUDOADZI FOR THE THIRD APPLICANT. <o:p></o:p>

</div>JUDGEMENT<o:p></o:p>Appau J. The
three applicants whose names appear above, viz Dr George Sipa-Yankey, Mr
Ibrahim Adams and Mr Kwame Peprah, are before this court on separate ex parte
applications praying the court to grant them leave to issue writs of habeas
corpus ad subjiciendum directed at the Director of Prisons, requesting him to
produce before this court the bodies of the applicants who are under his
custody and to state or explain to this court the reasons for their
incarceration or detention. They again prayed for further orders that this
court may deem fit to make.<o:p></o:p>Though
the applications were filed separately with different legal representations,
the cruxes of the three applications were the same. All three applicants were
criminally charged together with the same offence but under different counts on
the same charge sheet. They were tried together by the same judge, variously
found guilty on some of the counts and convicted and sentenced together on the
same day. Their applications are therefore grounded on the same pillar, ie that
their trial and conviction on that particular offence for which they were
charged constituted an infringement of their fundamental human rights as
enshrined in the Constitution, 1992 of the country since the charge of offence
was not permissible under the Constitution, 1992 or, simply, sins against the
Constitution, 1992. This means that their success or failure in this
application depends on the strength of this same pillar, which is the basis of
the application. This accounts for why this court found it necessary to deliver
just one ruling in respect of the three applications instead of three separate
rulings.<o:p></o:p>The
applications, which were filed on 16 May 2003, 6 May 2003 and 16 May 2003,
respectively were all supported by affidavits sworn to by the applicants
themselves but the contents of which were almost the same apart from very few
semantic differences. Also attached were statements of the applicants’ case as
required under Order 59, r 2(2) of the High Court (Civil Procedure) Rules, 1954
(LN 140A), which were also almost the same and then curiously too, copies of
the very judgment of the court that decreed their various detentions were
attached to the applications by each applicant.<o:p></o:p>I
have used the word “curiously” because it is rare that an applicant, in a
habeas corpus ad subjiciendum application, would attach to his application an
authentic legal document that explains in clear and indubitable terms the
reasons for his detention or incarceration, when the main purpose of such an
application is to seek the legal basis or the validity of an applicant’s
detention or incarceration. What I normally know from my humble legal knowledge
is that detentions that are challenged on such applications are those that are
not backed by any law or any authority, but not otherwise. Why these
applications then? Are they of any merit or not? The answers to these and other
questions could be sought from the applicants’ own affidavits supporting the
applications, the submissions made by their counsel and what the law in general
says about such applications.<o:p></o:p>I
will begin with the affidavits and the statements accompanying them and since
all the affidavits are almost the same I will sum up their contents and
possibly reproduce some major portions of one of them. In an epitome, the case
of the applicants in their affidavits and statements simply was that section
179A(3)(a) of our C</main>