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General News on Tuesday, January 22, 2019
Source: Starrfmonline.com
2019-01-22
The Supreme Court
A five-member panel of judges of the Supreme Court presided over by Judge Sophia Adenyira rejected an application by Exton Cubic Limited in which she challenged the jurisdiction of a high court to deny her a compensation for the seizure of his mining equipment.
According to the applicant, the meaning of Article 268 (1) of the 1992 Constitution was contradictory and the Human Rights Tribunal should have seized the Supreme Court for interpretation.
But after pleading their case before the courts, the Supreme Court ruled that section 268 (1) had already been interpreted and that the High Court had only applied it.
When the application was dismissed, the court also told the applicants that if anything at all should have appealed, instead of going to the court at the head of the court.
The request was however rejected.
Decision of the High Court
Last year, the High Court of Human Rights in Kumasi filed the case against the Ashanti Regional Minister, Mr. Simon Osei-Mensah, and the district director of Atwima Mponua, Mr. William Darko, by Exton Cubic, in compensation for the seizure. of his mining equipment.
The court, presided over by Judge George Addai Kwofa, concluded that the minister had done nothing wrong by seizing the material and that his action was acting.
On June 14, 2018, the court ruled that in his capacity as political leader of the region, the minister acted in good faith, the presence of equipment in the forest causing unrest among the population.
The Minister acted in accordance with the law, the lease allowing the company's access to the forest being subject to revision and withdrawal.
She also ruled that, by the minister's law, the equipment of the company was protected because the young people of the city could have vandalized it.
Context
In September 2017, Mr. Osei-Mensah ordered the police to seize eight trucks, a crawler generator and two container offices belonging to Engineers and Planners, subcontracted by Exton Cubic Group for the exploration of bauxite on the reserve. forest of Tano-Offin.
During the seizure, the company insisted on obtaining legal authorization from the government to work in the forest reserve.
However, the Minister of Lands and Natural Resources, John Peter Amewu, later explained that the company had not complied with the legal requirements and that his lease was therefore invalid.
He argued that the failure to obtain environmental and operational permits, as well as the various statutory offenses that led to the alleged granting of the three mining leases to the company, made the leases supposedly void and ineffective.
The Mahama government granted Exton Cubic a long-term lease on December 29, 2016, just days before the transfer of power to the government of the nuclear power plants.
Unsatisfied with the development, the company filed an application for certiorari to overturn Mr. Amewu's decision to revoke the mining leases granted to the company on September 4, 2017.
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