28/08/2023
ADMISSIBILITY OF UNREGISTERED TITLE DOCUMENTS IN BAMJAMIN V KALIO REMAINS THE LAW:
The case of Benjamin V Kalio (2018) 15 NWLR (Pt. 1641) 38 is a radical change in respect of admissibility of documents affecting land in Nigerian courts.
INTRODUCTION
The availability of land is the key to human existence, and its distribution and use are of vital importance. Being an important form of wealth, it has been necessary to regulate the manner in which land could be acquired.
Registration is the act of making formal entry into a register. It is safe and easy means of recording transactions on land and investigating title.
In its revolutionary decision in the case, the Supreme Court put paid to the perennial issue of admissibility of unregistered land documents. The court held that once the document is pleaded and relevant, it is admissible. In doing so, the court overruled decades of authorities on the point on the premise that the various land instruments registration laws in the country, which makes registration a condition sine qua non for admissibility, are unconstitutional the court reasoned that admissibility is governed by the Evidence Act 2011 which is a Federal Legislation and therefore any document or evidence admissible under the Evidence Act cannot be made inadmissible under the state law.
Ejembi Eko JSC, who delivered the lead judgement of the Court, pontificated as follows:
“ it is obvious to me, upon a painstaking and dispassionate perusal of section 20 of the Law, Cap 74 of Rivers State, that the Rivers State House of Assembly had purportedly enacted a piece of legislation on evidence. Their legislative intent or purport is clear and categorical, that no land instrument, which is not so registered, shall not be pleaded or give in evidence in any court as affecting land. This is clearly an act of legislative trespass into the exclusive legislative terrain of the National Assembly prescribed by the Constitution, since 1979. Section 20 of the Law Cap. 74 Rivers State, has therefore, rendered inadmissible Exhibit L, a piece of evidence that is relevant and admissible under the Evidence Act…… in my judgement; a piece of evidence pleadable and admissible in evidence by dint of the Evidence Act, cannot be rendered unpleadeable and inadmissible in evidence, by a law enacted by a State House of Assembly under the prevailing constitutional dispensation”
The decision is the best thing that has ever happened to proof of title to land in Nigeria in over a century.
Gbenga Bello said that the decision of the court in the case brings an encouraging comfort to purchasers of land or property who are yet to register their title, to use Conveyance to prove their title in court, and thereby doing away with technical objections to admissibility of such instruments. This decision lends to support commercial pursuit, as it will encourage transfer of property with relative ease, so that a purchaser who is yet to register his title will, nonetheless, be able to prove his title by evidencing the sale and conveyance without technical objection.
CONCLUSION:
It is submitted that the view Benjamin V Kalio has been overruled is absolutely incorrect. There is also no conflicting decision of the Supreme Court on the issue of Constitutionality of Land Instruments Registration Laws as they relate to evidence.
REFERENCE:
1. The Nigerian Land Law Adewale Taiwo
2. Evidence Act 2011
3. Rivers State Law
Written by Elizabeth Pohlolis Yakubu for Pan - African Institute of Paralegal Studies Abuja.
