Ghana High Commissioner Escalates River Park Estate Dispute With Nigeria to ECOWAS Court

Uzoma Mba 

Ghana has formally escalated the protracted River Park Estate dispute in Abuja to the ECOWAS Court, marking a significant diplomatic and legal turn in a controversy that now threatens to strain bilateral relations between Accra and Abuja.

Confirming the development, Ghana’s High Commissioner to Nigeria, Baba Jamal, disclosed that an official petition has been submitted to the regional bloc after earlier efforts at resolving the matter through engagement failed.

“When I became the High Commissioner, we properly briefed Accra, and that resulted in an official petition to ECOWAS,” Jamal said.

According to him, ECOWAS has since requested full documentation on the dispute, a process that Ghana is already completing.

“As I speak to you today, I have signed a letter that is supposed to send the official documentation and details,” he said. “Possibly, it will reach ECOWAS tomorrow.”

Jamal said Ghana initially exercised restraint to prevent the dispute from affecting long-standing diplomatic ties with Nigeria.

“We did not want to escalate this matter because we did not want this particular case to affect the excellent relationship between Ghana and Nigeria,” he said, describing the matter as “a simple business crisis” complicated by “intransigent positions.”

He, however, suggested that vested interests may be driving the crisis.

“What I can make out of all this is that some individuals are trying to push themselves, or push their power, to take over things that do not belong to them,” Jamal said.

The High Commissioner noted that the controversy predates his assumption of office.

“This problem started before I assumed office in Nigeria as High Commissioner,” he said, adding that he had attended several meetings where both parties presented their positions.

The diplomatic escalation follows sustained complaints by Jonah Capital, a Ghanaian investment firm, which alleges harassment, document falsification and breach of agreement by Nigerian authorities over ownership of the River Park Estate.

Speaking in an interview with Joy TV, Jonah Capital CEO, Kojo Mensah, said his company was shocked by the actions of Nigeria’s Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC), dismissing claims that the firm failed to attend meetings convened by the agency.

“In fact, it came to us as a surprise. The CAC never wrote to us,” Mensah said. “They wrote a letter to the Attorney General, peddling lies that we did not turn up for the meeting.”

He countered the CAC’s position by citing video evidence posted by the CAC Commissioner himself.

“The CAC Commissioner is fond of posting videos of everything he does, so we have the video which he himself posted on his CAC Instagram, showing our lawyers being present and also the representative of the Attorney General being present for the meeting,” he stated.

Mensah maintained that Jonah Capital’s ownership of the estate is supported by extensive documentation dating back to 2012.

“The share certificates have been prepared. Transfer forms were signed by me and are sitting with the lawyers in Abuja,” he said, referencing an email dated June 27, 2012, allegedly sent by one John Tanley Johnson.

According to him, the share certificate—described as “the bedrock of the company”—was emailed on July 4, 2012, by the accountant of Adren Ogunmuirwa, with Ogunmuirwa copied in the correspondence.

“This is the share certificate they sent to us,” Mensah said. “These are some of the documents we shared with the Nigeria Police, along with a copious number of documents which established our ownership of the estate.”

He added that Jonah Capital also possesses FedEx records connected to the transmission of the documents in 2012.

On the possibility of legal action against the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Minister, Mensah said no final decision had been taken, although concerns had been formally communicated.

“We have not even made the decision of whether we are going to sue the FCT Minister for the breach or alleged breach of the agreement,” he said. “They wrote to us after the FCT Minister made his pronouncement and asked us to preserve the agreement.”

He disclosed that the company had raised concerns over the termination clause of the agreement and requested further engagement.

“We wrote to the General Counsel that even though we have commenced the exercise that we have been asked to do, we have issues with the clause of termination, and we have asked for a meeting to engage,” Mensah said.

Jamal said Ghana is hopeful that the ECOWAS intervention will lead to an amicable resolution.

“We are hoping that we will be able to resolve this matter without it escalating further,” he said, confirming that the dispute is now headed to the ECOWAS Court for adjudication.