Thread by @savndaniel

SOMEONE SENT ME POST SHARED BY ONE Napoleon Uforo Umoh and it had this to say about it.

I hereby acknowledge the original author of this piece. I don't know why his name was removed and replace with 'copied'. Whoever you are, I had a good read and so many memories came through.

LAWYERS DON'T NEED YOUR MONEY.

YOU NEED LAWYERS!

"I want to share a personal experience that I hope would teach most Nigerians a vital lesson about appreciating legal counsel and services.

A lesson that I hope would reset the minds of Nigerians who often ask;

"what's the big deal about lawyers?

"Is it not to copy and paste agreements?".

Or those who say "lawyers are overrated".

I pray you won't learn the hard way like my client just did.

I lost a case in court 2 days ago.

I was expected to lose.

I knew I was going to lose.

And yet I took the case because that's what lawyers do. We defend good cases and bad cases. It's our cross.

The value of the case or land my client lost in court is approximately 105Million Naira!

Again, he was fated to lose it.

But why?

The simple and straightforward answer is;

POWER OF ATTORNEY.

In summary, he bought an expanse of land from the owner's mother, but unfortunately for him it turned out that the said mother never had authority to sell on her daughter's behalf.

My client bought the land solely based on the oral representations and assurances of the ailing and aged mother and also because she had original title documents to the land in her possession.

According to her (owner's mother), she was instructed by her daughter (who is domiciled in UK) to use the original documents as evidence of ownership to prospective buyers.

It turned out that the daughter would later deny EVER giving her mother any instructions to sell her land. Some bad blood was later discovered between mother and daughter.

My client, sadly, had gone ahead to build a massive edifice on the land worth approximately 90Million Naira.

The case came to me only AFTER the daughter sued, claiming statutory right of occupancy and alleging trespass against him.

The 1st question I asked my colleague (now deceased who gave me the Brief was; "Did the mother show him a duly executed Power of Attorney?"
The answer was "No". All she showed him were original land purchase receipts given to her daughter by prior owners and original survey plan.

No written authorisation from daughter to mother which is required by extant statutes and a plethora of case laws.

From the start I knew it was practically impossible to win, so I did the wise thing; I sought Amicable Settlement.

Settlement talks failed as my client was not ready to eke out the amount the claimant demanded.

I was then left with the only option of fighting it out in court knowing full well that the law and judicial precedent were not on my side.

The Judge delivered a thorough and incisive judgement in the daughter's favour. I couldn't disagree with the Judge's reasoning.

Immediately, I applied for a copy of the Judgement and I advised my client not to bother appealing. He said he never intended to.

My client has told me he has not had a good sleep since the judgement was delivered. I became an overnight counsellor and life coach, motivating him the best way I could.

So where are we now?

The daughter and her lawyer, now armed with a favourable judgement, are willing to resell the land with the almost 90Million Naira investment or property on it to my client. We have scheduled a meeting for sometime next week.

When I asked my client he told me that in total he has spent approximately 105Million Naira on that land. That includes the 8Million Naira initial purchase price which he paid to the claimant's mother.

On my part, following my advice, my client has instructed me to file an action against her mother for fraudulent misrepresentation and claim special and general damages. This would only be necessary IF our repurchase compromise talks with her daughter fails.

Why is all this important?

They are important as valuable lessons to be learnt.

My client has admitted his ignorance and mistakes. If he had consulted a lawyer BEFORE buying from the said mother he would have saved himself some 105Million Naira and a lot of personal grief.

A good lawyer worthy of that title would have demanded to see a duly executed Power of Attorney and even speak directly with the daughter who admittedly was the owner.

He would have also gone ahead to do Due Diligence by conducting necessary searches and investigations on the land. And then prepare a Deed for due execution.

If my client had spent just 1Million Naira on a lawyer to do all that, he would have saved 105Million Naira.

But oh no, lawyers just want to chop money.

I pity you.

I feel for my client because he has learned his own lesson the hard way. I feel for him because I know majority of Nigerians have the same attitude towards lawyers, and they get away with it, UNTIL....

#TruthIsSacre

#Selah.

A Copied Post.