IKECHOKWU & ORS.
V.
OLISAKA
S.A. OLAGUNJU, J.C.A, (Delivering the Leading Judgment): The appeal is from the Ruling of Emekwue, J., on admissibility of a document which was rejected by the learned trial judge on the ground other than the one raised by the counsel opposing the admission of the document giving rise, primarily, to the propriety of a court raising an issue suo motu and basing its decision on it without giving the parties the opportunity to address it on the point. The material facts from which the appeal arose can be summarized as hereunder.
In an action for declaration of title to land, perpetual injunction and damages the plaintiff, the respondent herein, in paragraph 7 of his amended statement of claim pleaded a Deed of Lease, he entered with the family of the Defendants which is repudiated by the Defendants in paragraph 8 of their amended statement of defence. At the trial, the plaintiff who testified as 1PW, did not produce the document during his examination-in-chief and during cross-examinatio…