Alhaji Dabo Sambo & Anor V. Hajiya Amina Abubakar (1995)

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MAHMUD MOHAMMED, J.C.A. 

In the High Court of Justice of Kaduna State, the appellants herein as plaintiffs brought an action against Alhaji Abdu Abubakar, now deceased, as the defendant claiming the following reliefs in their Writ of Summons dated 30th January 1986 –

“The plaintiffs claim against the defendant, is for the sum of N131,815.00 (One hundred and thirty one thousand, eight hundred and fifteen naira) being the cost of 19 (nineteen) Peugeot vehicles of various brands supplied to the defendant on credit at his own request within the jurisdiction of this Honourable Court.”

PARTICULARS

On the 26th day of August 1982, the defendant requested the plaintiffs to supply and deliver the following units of Peugeot vehicles of various descriptions:-

8 x 505 SR, 6 x 305 SR and 5 x 504 family; all totalling 19 units. The aforesaid written request of the defendant, dated 26th August, 1982, was made in Kaduna, within the jurisdiction of this Honourable Court. The plaintiffs delivered the aforesaid vehicles as requested by the defendant, who had since failed, refused and or neglected to pay the said sum of N131,815.00 being the purchase price of the vehicles aforesaid.

WHEREUPON the plaintiffs claim against the defendant is for the sum of N131,815.00 plus 10% interest at court rate on same amount, from August 1982 up to date of judgment and thereafter until the whole debt aforesaid is liquidated by the defendant.”

Pleadings were filed and exchanged between the parties.

The case proceeded to trial before Akaahs J on further amended statement of claim and statement of defence respectively both filed with the leave of that court. Hearing in the case which commenced in September 1988 and which lasted for over two years finally ended with the judgment delivered by the learned trial Judge dismissing the entire claim of the plaintiffs on 7th November 1991. Part of the judgment of the trial court at pages 30 – 31 of the record reads:-

“….The plaintiffs knew all along that the transaction was with the NPN and not with the defendant even though the defendant issued Exhibits 4 and 5 to ensure that the cars were delivered to the NPN.

With these series of admissions as highlighted above, the logical conclusion that I must reach is that the 1st plaintiff knew he was dealing with NPN and not the defendant and despite the use of the word ‘compromise’ in exhibit 4, the plaintiff was aware that the defendant was not going to pay for the cars. One can only speculate from Exhibit12 which bore the same date as Exhibit 5 that the 1st plaintiff wanted to discuss with the defendant on the ways and means whereby the money for the vehicles could be raised. It is only Chief Akinloye who could have clarified the situation as to why he wanted the defendant to pay for the vehicles. In the absence of such an explanation, the defendant cannot be bound by the contents in Exhibit 1 and Exhibit 4 did not create such liability.”

The plaintiffs, now appellants in this appeal who were not happy with this decision of the trial court had appealed to this Court against it. Their notice of appeal dated 10th January 1992 contains 2 original grounds of appeal including the omnibus ground. An additional ground of appeal was later filed by the appellants with the leave of this Court on 14th October 1993. However, before this appeal came up for hearing, following the death of the respondent, on application of the appellants to this Court on 13/5/1993 his wife Hajiya Amina Abubakar was substituted as the respondent in place of her deceased husband Alhaji Abdu Abubakar. Both learned counsel to the parties had filed their respective briefs of argument which they expatiated in their oral argument before us. The appellants’ brief had identified the following 3 issues for determination which were also adopted in the respondent’s brief. The issues are:-

1. “Whether Exhibit 4 which was written by the defendant to the plaintiffs constituted a firm commitment to pay as understood by the plaintiff.
2. Whether it will be inequitable to allow the defendant to resile from the promises and/or actions to pay which the plaintiffs had relied on to their detriment.
3. Whether the judgment is unreasonable having regard to the weight of evidence.”

For a better appreciation of the issues for determination in this appeal, I will set out briefly the case presented at the trial court by both parties.

According to the record of the trial court, the undisputed facts of this case are that in September 1982 the plaintiffs/appellants who were dealers with the Peugeot Automobiles Nigeria Limited Kaduna where the defendant/respondent was the Chairman, supplied the National Party of Nigeria, N.P.N. (now proscribed) with 19 different brands of Peugeot cars at the total cost of N131,814.00. The cars were earlier allocated to the plaintiffs with the assistance of the respondent as special allocation from Peugeot Automobiles (Nig.) Ltd. to enable the plaintiffs to meet up with the order for the vehicles by the defunct National Party of Nigeria N.P.N. Although all the 19 cars were duly supplied to the N.P.N which took delivery thereof, the N.P.N did not pay for the cars, nor did the plaintiffs/appellants also pay for the supply of the cars to them by the manufacturers Peugeot Automobile (Nigeria) Ltd. which opened a special account for the plaintiffs/appellants under which the cost of the cars could be settled by the plaintiffs/appellants as one of the dealers of the Company. Following the failure of the plaintiffs/appellants to settle this special account in payment of the 19 cars supplied, Peugeot Automobile (Nig.) Ltd. wrote a letter of demand to the plaintiffs/appellants asking for the payment of the cost of the cars in January 1985. At the time this demand for payment was made on the plaintiffs/appellants, the N.P.N to which the 19 cars were actually supplied was no longer in existence having been proscribed after the Military takeover in the country at the end of 1983. The appellants therefore responded to the demand for the payment by pointing out in separate letters to Peugeot Automobile (Nig.) Ltd. and the respondent that the respondent was supposed to have paid for the cars. All the same the plaintiffs/appellants settles their special account with Peugeot Automobile Nig. Ltd. by the payment of the demanded sum of N131,815.00 being the cost of the 19 cars. The plaintiffs/appellants then turned to the respondent and claimed the same amount from him in the action at the lower court that gave rise to this appeal alleging that the cars were supplied to the defunct N.P.N at the request of the respondent who was not only directed to pay for them but also promised to pay before the cars were supplied.