JAURO DANBABA V. MALLAM SALE ALHAJI ALI

SANUSI, JCA (Delivering the Lead Judgment): This is an appeal against the decision of the Yobe State High Court, sitting in its appellate jurisdiction in suit No. YB/DT/28/96 delivered on 28/11/1996, wherein it affirmed the decision of Fune Upper Area Court in suit No. CV/54/91. The plaintiff/appellant sued the two respondents/defendants for repossession of a compound and a farm land which the appellant claimed he gave the respondents’ father on loan. At the trial court the appellant’s claim in substance read thus:

“My claim against Mallam Sale is over a farm which I gave his father on loan. They dwell in one part and cultivated the other. Following the death of his father, when I approached him about the farm, he denied any knowledge about this matter.

At the time I was giving the father of the plaintiff, Alhaji Shehu the farm on loan, it was on the arrangement and understanding that any time he was leaving or moving out of the area he would return it to me. This incident took place…