Studies in Litigation Against the Church in Nigeria: The Case of Basilica of Grace, Abbi

Abstract

This study captures in vivid perspectives, the legal battles that the Church has come to face in recent times in Nigeria over land. For this case-study that is focused on the Basilica of Grace, Abbi in Ndokwa West Local Government Area of Delta State Nigeria, attempt shall be made to concentrate on the legal struggles the Church began to face in recent times arising from land hunger and the emergence of the commercializing influence of capitalism on the Church in Nigeria. The Church in Nigeria has become hugely wealthy that attack on it has become quite fashionable with the hope and aim that in the calculated process of litigating with the Church over land, the Church may cave into settlement with the disputants and in the process, the disputants may ‘hack into the finances of the Church’ and ‘chop out a large chunk-of-cash from the tilt of the Church’ in order for the Church to have peace. This study which adopts the doctrinal method interrogates the circumstances that led the Basilica of Grace, Abbi (under the Registered Trustees of Diocese of Ndokwa Church of Nigeria Anglican Communion) into a pernicious legal battle with Femi Ojuyenum and six others representing Ogwezzi-Amacha family of Umu-Onyugba Street of Abbi. The study traces the origin of the grant of the land to the Church, the ceding of a part to the State for School as a Missionary Society and the pseudo reversionary claim of the Ogwezzi-Amacha family and the conveyance of same to unscrupulous ‘money bags’ in Abbi community who have taken turns to transfer the land in millions from one ‘Barron’ to another to the discomfiture of the Church at Abbi. It further interrogates the legal processes and pleadings of the parties through the trial court to the various appellate courts in details and captures the socio-legal influences driving the litigation. The study finds that those who dabbled into the litigation with the Basilica of Grace did so for selfish interest and in a calculated desire to upturn the grant made by the early fathers of Abbi community to the Christian Missionary Society on the spurious claims that those forefathers who made the grant in relative antiquity were merely overwhelmed by European civilizing influence and uninformed of the ancient and current value of land. The study found further that the litigation was being fought in the face of a customary arbitration against the antagonists of the Church. The study therefore suggests and recommends that the claims and attacks against the grant and the Church should be repudiated and dropped by the defendants to ‘allow sleeping dog lie’.