Godfred Dame, Attorney-General and Minister of Justice
By a unanimous preliminary determination, the Supreme Court of Norway has denied the grant of leave to appeal to Messrs. Jongsbru AS, party to a prior judgment of the Norway Court of Appeal, which was in favour of the Government of Ghana.
Messrs. Jongsbru AS are the sellers of a property identified by Ghana for use as a Chancery property in Oslo, Norway.
The decision by the Norwegian Supreme Court means that the earlier ruling by the Oslo Court of Appeal, which fully acquitted Ghana of Jongsbru’s claim, and obligated Jongsbru to pay Ghana compensation for legal costs before the District (High) Court and the Court of Appeal with a total of NOK2.5 million or approximately $250, 000, is final.
The decision
The Supreme Court’s determination of Jongsbru’s attempt to appeal the judgment was made without the parties appearing before the court.
A panel of three Supreme Court judges had to first determine whether to allow the appeal to be heard by the Supreme Court and explicitly allow for same to be heard before it would proceed to hear and give a judgment on it.
If the panel does not allow the appeal to be heard, the appeal terminates without any further processes at the Supreme Court.
The ground on which the Norwegian Supreme Court will hear an appeal is where a new or major issue of law is raised in the matter, and the court feels obligated to give legal clarity on the position. The Norway Supreme Court does not hear an appeal on matters concerning the facts or evidence in a civil matter.
In this attempt to appeal, Jongsbru had contended that the reasoning by the Court of Appeal in its judgment was too short, vague, unclear, and contained deficiencies that rendered a proper appeal on the merits impossible and therefore, the judgment had to be “repealed”.
An application for a judgment to be repealed, in Norwegian law, is similar to a request to set aside the judgment.
Due to the summary determination of this appeal by the Supreme Court, the court further ordered Jongsbru to compensate Ghana nominal legal costs before the Supreme Court in the sum of NOK18, 750 approximately $1, 871. This is a fixed rate applied in such summary proceedings before the Supreme Court of Norway.
A-G’s view
According to the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, Godfred Yeboah Dame, the decision of the Norway Supreme Court not to allow the appeal against the judgement of the Court of Appeal is satisfactory.
He expressed delight that the fight, which had raged on for the past four years, had been concluded.
“All costs awarded in favour of Ghana still outstanding would be immediately paid by the losing party, in accordance with Norwegian civil procedure to mitigate expenses incurred in defending the interests of Ghana across all the courts,” he explained.
Facts of case
In 2018, Ghana decided to establish an embassy in Norway, for which Parliament approved the grant of funds, as well as other missions around the world.
A delegation of four Ghanaian officials was appointed to go to Norway to carry out the necessary practical and administrative preparations for the establishment of the embassy. Among the preparations to be made was the acquisition of a Chancery building, either by purchase or lease.
The Ghanaian delegation identified a number of properties, including Sigyns Gate 3 at Frogner in Oslo, the property which became the subject matter of the litigation in the District Court of Norway.
For legal assistance, Ghana hired a lawyer, Mikkel Vislie, from the Law Firm of Selmer.
Original trial, ruling
The Oslo District Court, in its judgement on December 16, 2021, said the binding competence lay with Ghana’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, per Section 20 of the State Property and Contracts Act of 1960.
Under Ghana’s law, the Procurement Board must agree on the purchase of the property and the application of funds must also be approved of by the Minister of Finance. The Minister of Foreign Affairs must also either personally execute the agreement for the purchase of the property or authorise another competent person by a power of attorney to execute the agreement.
The court found that neither the charge d’affaires of Ghana at the time, Mrs Appiah-Sam, nor Ghana’s lawyer, Mikkel Visllie, had the authority to enter into the agreement on behalf of Ghana.
“There was thus no valid or binding agreement between the sellers of the property and Ghana. In the circumstances, Ghana will be fully cleared of any liability to Jongsbru arising from the transaction and awarded procedural costs of one million, seven hundred Norwegian Kronner,” the judgment stated.
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