The plaintiffs’ case, as pleaded in their amended statement of claim, was that the land in dispute was a portion of a larger parcel of land which originally belonged to one Oyero of Onigbongbo Village. It was their case that the said Oyero had three children namely – Aina Adu, Taiwo Jabita and Kehinde Ebo; that the said children of Oyero inherited the whole of his landed property after his death in accordance with Yoruba customary law; that in 1946 there was a partition of Oyero’s land among his three children, and that the land at Mende village, which is the land in dispute, was the portion allotted to Taiwo Jabita, while other children were allotted other portions of Oyero’s land; that after the partition, various allottees were put in possession of their respective portions; that about 1954, Bello Taiwo Jabita (alias Kosegbe), the only son of Jabita, sold the land allotted to Taiwo Jabita at Mende village to the plaintiffs; that the portion sold to the plaintiffs was conveyed to them by virtue of a deed of conveyance dated 4th September, 1954 and registered as No. 49 at page 49 in Volume K1 (Colony) of the register of deeds at the office in Lagos, that after the sale to the plaintiffs, they were put in possession by their vendor; and that the plaintiffs thereafter put a caretaker on the land and exercised other acts of ownership on it without disturbance until about 1970 when the defendants trespassed on the land, and in spite of the plaintiffs’ protest, have continued their acts of trespass ever since.

In their amended statement of defence, the defendants denied ever trespassing on the plaintiffs’ land. It was their case that they leased or bought the land in dispute from the Oyero family who jointly owned the land and who put them in possession; that the Oyero family land was never partitioned as claimed by the plaintiffs; that at one time when there was news that one Bello Isiba, without family consent, was dealing with family land, notices were put on the land warning prospective purchasers not to transact business with the said Bello Isiba; that later an action was instituted against the said Bello Isiba and one Folarin in suit No. AB/3/55 in respect of a portion of family land and judgement was obtained against them.

There was evidence that the respondents had been in possession of the land before the appellants. The trial Judge dismissed the plaintiffs claim for a declaration of title but awarded them damages for trespass and a restraining injunction against the defendants.

Both parties appealed to the Court of Appeal where their appeals were dismissed.

Still dissatisfied, they appealed to the Supreme Court.