AMANKRA V. ZANKLEY

• Pages: 243-246

AMA.NKRA V. ZANKLEY

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243

AMANKRA V. ZANKLEY

5

REBECCA AMANKRA

V

10 LATEY ZANKLEY

SUPREME COURT OF NIGERIA

TAYLOR,

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J.S.C.

BAIRAMIAN,

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J.S.C.

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MORGAN, Ag. J.S.C.

29th October 1963.

APPELLANT

RESPONDENT

SUIT NO. FSC 71/1962

Legislation - Land Registration Act, s.15, s.16, s.17, s.18, s.25, s.28.

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Land Law - Registration of Land instruments - Competing conveyances - Priorities.

ISSUE:

1. Whether a court will give priority to the latter of two competing conveyances

where it was registered under the Land Registration Act before the earlier

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conveyance.

FACTS:

An unregistered conveyance cannot be pleaded or given in evidence: s. 15 of

the Land Registration Act. Subject to the provisions of the Act, a registered con-

veyance takes effect, as against other conveyances affecting the same land, from

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the date of registration: s.16(1). Of section 17 is enough to give the following pro-

visions -

"17(1) Any person desiring that any instrument shall be registered shall deliver

the same together with a true copy thereof and the prescribed fee to the

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registrar at the office.

(2)

The registrar shall, immediately after such delivery, place upon the

instrument and upon the copy thereof a certificate, as in Form B in the

First Schedule.

(3)

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(4)

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; and upon such registration the year, month, day and hour

specified in the certificate endorsed on the instrument in pursuance of

subsection (2) shall be taken to be the year, month, day and hour at which

the instrument was registered."

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Under s.18 registration may for certain reasons be refused, but may be granted

later, and then the day and hour

Of

the subsequent delivery of the instrument is

taken as the day and hour of registration. (The text is not given in the judgment,

and need not be given here, for the judgment mentions s.18 for the sake of stress-

ing the importance of the day and hour of registration, already stressed in s.17).

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Registration does not cure a defect in a conveyance or, subject to the provisions

of the Act, confer upon it any effect or validity which would not otherwise have had:

s.25. A person may search the register and files of registered and filed docu-

ments: s.28. (Text of ss.15,16,25,28 in the judgment).