Selemani s/o Dadi v. Lata d/o Alli, (PC) Civ. App. 108-D-67, 10/10/67, Biron J.

Selemani s/o Dadi v. Lata d/o Alli, (PC) Civ. App. 108-D-67, 10/10/67, Biron J.

Plaintiff claimed title to a shamba, which he said had been sold to him by defendant’s father some thirty years previously. He alleged that there had been three witnesses to the sale, two who were dead and a third whose whereabouts were unknown. He testified that the document recording the sale had burned with his house five years previous to the suit. One of his witnesses, however, stated that plaintiff had been tapping palm wine from the trees on the premises for the past three years, during the lifetime of the defendant’s father, another stated that he had been picking coconuts from these trees for the plaintiff for the past twelve years. Defendant, claiming the shamba by inheritance, stated that she had never been informed of the sale; her brother, who did not live in the vicinity, gave the same testimony. The Primary and District Courts found for the defendant, apparently on the ground that plaintiff had not produced documents or direct verbal evidence of the sale itself.

            Held: The independent evidence was that plaintiff’s possession had continued for twelve years, and his uncontroverted testimony was that it had continued for thirty years. “In the circumstances the absence of documentary evidence --- and the appellant’s explanation for such absence is perfectly reasonable and plausible --- was by no means fatal.”