This appeal is on a land matter. It is against concurrent decisions of the High Court of the then East Central State of Nigeria, holden at ABA, which later metamorphosed into the High Court of the present Imo State (trial court) and the Port Harcourt Judicial Division of the Court of Appeal (the court below). The plaintiffs at the trial court, (who are the respondent herein) took out a writ of summons wherein they made the following claims against the defendants (who are now the appellants):

Paragraph 17 of the Amended Statement of Claim repeated the above reliefs sought from the trial court. The plaintiffs sued the defendants for themselves and as representatives of Umuarapa family in Uratta Community-Okpu Umuobo in Aba Division. The defendants are members of Umuaduru family in the same Uratta community and were sued personally.

The respondents as plaintiffs at the trial court traced their traditional history of the land in dispute by way of grant from Mgboko led by Afaraukwa, the original customary owners of the vast area of land including the land in dispute. According to the respondents, Mgboko who originally founded the vast area of land including the land in dispute settled Okpokoroipi of Uratta Umuobo, the respondents’ kinsman, on a part of the said land. The respondents' people of Umuarapara in Uratta Umuobo through lkpeameze traced theirs kinsman, Okpokoroipi, to Mgboko and Okpokoroipi sub-granted the respondents the land in dispute, being a portion of the land granted to him (Okpokoroipi) by Mgboko.

The appellants/defendants case was total denial of the defendants' claim over the land in dispute which the defendants claimed was deforested by their own ancestors who were in possession as owners until it devolved on them.

After full trial, the trial court in its judgment found for the plaintiffs and granted all the reliefs sought by them. This, on appeal, was affirmed by the court below.