OBASEKI, J.S.C. (Presiding and Delivering the Leading Judgment): This appeal came up for hearing on the 17th day of February, 1987. After reading the record of appeal, the judgment of the Court of Appeal and the High Court, the briefs of arguments filed by the parties to this appeal and hearing the submissions of counsel for the parties in oral argument, I found substantial merit in the appeal and allowed it. I set aside the decision of the Court of Appeal and remitted the case to the Court of Appeal for the appeal to it to be heard de novo with liberty to the appellant represented by the plaintiff/respondent herein to be heard in the appeal. I then indicated that my reasons for the judgment would be delivered today. I now proceed to give and deliver those reasons.
The main complaint of the appellant was that the Court of Appeal denied the represented parties a hearing in the appeal after Alhaji Chief Yekini Otapo who represented the appellant and others had declined to contest the ap…