Lasisi Adeoye Adelebare V. Niger Motors Ltd (1974)

LawGlobal-Hub Lead Judgment Report

O. ELIAS, C.J.N. 

In Suit No. LD/83/69 delivered at the Ikeja High Court, Lagos State, on July 5, 1971, Dosunmu, J., dismissed the action brought against the defendant claiming the sum of 6,211 Pounds being special and general damages for the alleged unlawful seizure and sale by the defendants, their servants or agents of a vehicle Bedford Bus LH. 9495, which was lawfully in the possession of the plaintiff as a hirer. The vehicle was seized on or about May 28, 1965 and sold subsequently by the defendants.

The admitted facts are these. The plaintiff, intending to purchase a Bedford bus, approached the defendants with his request, and the defendants, unable to grant the plaintiff the credit involved on their own account, arranged with Bentworth Finance (Nigeria) Limited (hereinafter referred to simply at Bentworth) for the transfer of the ownership to Bentworth which then entered into a hire purchase agreement with the plaintiff.

When the plaintiff first defaulted with the payment of his installments, the defendants acting as the agent of Bentworth, seized the vehicle. Bentworth then called upon the defendants to settle the unpaid balance of 5,070 Pounds (N10,141.00) and the ownership of the vehicle once more vested in the defendants. This happened in on of two ways. In the first place, under a deed of assignment, Bentworth purported to have transferred to the defendants “all the rights and obligations” arising under andy by virtue of the hire purchase agreement between Bentworth and the plaintiff.

The defendants, however, took the precautionary step of executing a separate and independent “hire purchase” agreement with the plaintiff, apparently on forms bearing the heading of Bentworth later changed to that of the defendants. Evidence was led to show that Bentworth and the defendants worked hand in glove in the three-cornered transaction between customer, dealer and finance company which the sale of vehicles usually entailed; and that the papers of the one were often used by the other in such transactions.

There are two other aspects of this second agreement that should be noted. The first is that, in the hurly-burly of executing the agreement, the defendants forgot to sign it, although the plaintiff as the party to be charged did. The second is that the agreement gave the defendants power to seize the vehicle and sell it upon failure by the plaintiff to keep up with his installment payments.

At the trial of the action the plaintiff argued that

“(i) he was throughout dealing with Bentworth and not with the defendants,

(ii) that the purported deed of assignment between Bentworth and the defendants were ineffective to pass to the defendants the personal rights of Bentworth to seize and sell the vehicle on his default with the installments because no written notice of the purported assignment (Ex. O) was ever given to the defendants as required by section 136 of the Law of Property Act, 1925, and

(iii) that the second agreement carried the heading of Bentworth which was later altered to “Niger Motors Ltd.” and was in any case not executed by the defendants.

“The learned trial judge observed:

“It is my view, however, that the instant case must be distinguished on the facts because in addition to the purported assignment, the defendant company made the plaintiff to enter into a fresh hire-purchase agreement.

It is in pursuance of this agreement that the defendant company proceeded to repossess the vehicle.”

As regards the plaintiff’s contention that, assuming that there was a valid assignment, the licence to seize the vehicle being a personal right which was not assignable, the learned trial judge said: