The busy High Court of Kumasi has dismissed on grounds of statute of limitation claims for retrenchment packages brought by 500 former employees of Anglogold Ashanti in the case of Peter Eshun & 499 Ors.vrs. Anglogold Ahanti (Ghana) Ltd. (suit no. C12/63/23)

In his usual clarity in analysis, the learned Court of Appeal Justice sitting as an additional Judge of the High Court on the 7th day of July, 2025 dismissed in entirety the claims of 500 persons who were retrenched from the employment of the Obuasi based mine and Defendant, Anglogold Ashanti.

Statute Bar

His Lordship the Presiding Judge, Dr. Adusei Poku, uphled the arguments of the Defendant mine through their lawyers at Osewuo Chambers led by the learned and respected O.K. Osafo Buabeng deputised by his abled lieutenant, the gentle Appiahene Osei Akoto Esq.

Animated by the 6 year timeframe for bringing an action on a contract under the Statute of Limitation and invigorated by the legal maxim of litigation ought to see an end, the Court held that the case of the Plaintiffs were caught by the timelimes set by law and thus any claims arising from their retrenchment in 2013-2014 cannot be litigated in 2024, some years after the legal timeline barricade against their action.

Exceptions to statute bar

Tried as the learned Nana Obiri Boahen and his lieutenant, Asamoah Baffour Okyere Esq. did, the Court did not find favour with their ingenious attempt of derailing the statute bar train set in motion by his opposite number, Osafo Buabeng, Counsel for the Defendant.

The Court held that the exception of fraud as raised by the Plaintiffs against the statute of limitation was not supported by the evidence provided to the Court by the Plaintiffs.

High Court and Labour Commission Streams

On the issue of the failure of the case of the Plaintiffs at the Labour Commission and the attempt to relitigate same at the High Court, His Lordship restated the position of the law on the appellate forum for a party at the Labour Commission and emphasised on the foreclosure of the forum of the High Court upon the election of the Labour Commission by a party to ventilate grievances in labour disputes.

In a clear voice, His Lordship said at page 15 of the Judgment of the Court with a copy of the full judgment below as follows:

"The statutory route to challenging a decision, order or direction of the Labour Commission is by way of an appeal to the Court of Appeal. In the hierarchies of the labour dispute resolution fora, the principle that there must be an end to litigation, as expressed in the Latin maxim interest rei publicae ut sit finis litium is dominant and must be applied rigorously. In the instant case, therefore, it would be untenable for the plaintiffs to relitigate matters concluded on its merit between the parties at the Labour Commission at the High Court, instead of the aggrieved party exercising the right of appeal therefrom"