According to his particulars of claim, the plaintiff (now appellant) is the owner of a farm called Dinging Farm which is an orchard farm at Langlang in the former Benue Plateau State of Nigeria. He had on the farm citrus trees which were yielding fruits. Between the months of October, 1971, and July, 1972, the defendants (now appellants), a firm of engineering and building contractors, while engaged in the construction of the Amper-Shendam Road in the said Benue Plateau State, by their servants and agents, committed acts of trespass on the plaintiff's farm. Although the farm was fenced round with barbed wire, the defendants broke into and entered the farm with their caterpillars, tractors and bulldozers and destroyed the trees growing therein.

The plaintiff also complained that on diverse dates within the same period, the defendants by their said servants and agents wrongfully committed waste in the said farm by "felling, lopping, topping and shrouding the economic trees", such as orange, cashew and guava trees growing there; they also uprooted the wire fence and hedges around the farm and excavated portions of it leaving behind deep tranches, pits and holes.

Despite repeated demands by the plaintiff to the defendants to stop these various acts of trespass, the defendants refused to comply with the demand. In view of the damage and loss suffered as a result, the plaintiff claimed from the defendants in the Benue/Plateau Judicial Division of the High Court of the for¬mer Northern States, the sum of N147,066.60 as special and general damages.

The learned trial Judge, after considering the evidence adduced by both par¬ties found, in a reserved judgment, that the plaintiff had proved his case but he, nevertheless, refused to make an award in respect of the claim of £12,000 for the reclamation of the excavated por¬tion of the farm after the uprooting and destruction by the defendants of the economic trees there. He also refused to make an award in respect of the claim of £20,000 for general damages.

The appellant appealed against the quantum of damages awarded.