Court convicts 3 bishops for contempt

Three bishops of Holy Apostolic Reformed Church (HARC) have been sentenced to five days’ imprisonment for further contempt of court.

Apostle Samuel Anang Sowah, Bishop Abraham Adjetey Adjei and Bishop Daniel Buernor Tokoli, were initially found guilty of contempt of court by a High Court in Accra but were cautioned and discharged.

However, they were found to be guilty of further contempt of court after going ahead to enter the premises of the church knowing very well that there is an ongoing case against them and a motion for interlocutory injunction against them is still pending.

According to the Registered Trustees of the church, who are the applicants, the defendants, in spite of their previous conviction and the pendency of the motion for injunction, went ahead to do the very things the said motion for contempt sought to prevent them from doing – by going to the chapels in Nungua and Tema on October 29, 2023.

They, therefore, prayed the court to further attach the bishops for further contempt for defying the orders of the court.

The bishops, in their defence, admitted the ruling of the court which convicted them for contempt, but averred that after the court convicted them and imposed a sentence of a caution and discharge, no consequential order was made.

They further stated that they being dissatisfied and aggrieved by the said ruling, filed an appeal against it and applied for a suspension of the orders as contained in that ruling and same was granted.

The bishops, through their counsel, also argued that logically once the interlocutory injunction order had been suspended, whatever it earlier prevented them to do fell flat, adding that there was currently no order of the court pending against them which they defied.

But the court presided over by Justice William Boampong, in his ruling, held that since the bishops were prohibited from continuing to use the chapels of the plaintiff to conduct Sunday Services, they need not to rely on any consequential orders of the court to enable them to comply with that order, hence their defence in that direction failed.

He also found that a critical look at the order suspending a ruling of the court which the bishops relied on in their defence, indicate that the ruling relates to a different suit and not this very suit.

“The very ruling in this present case however had not been appealed against and no suspension of the order in this Suit No. GJ/1054/2022 had been obtained. In this very suit, also the respondents had not denied that they had not done what the earlier ruling in this suit prohibited them from doing,” the court held.

Justice Boampong, therefore, found Apostle Samuel Anang Sowah, Bishop Abraham Adjetey Adjei and Bishop Daniel Buernor Tokoli to be in further contempt of court, and convicted them for same.

He said the three were earlier cautioned and discharged in the earlier contempt case, but they went and repeated what the court restrained them to do, hence they should be made to respect the law.

The court, therefore, sentenced them to five days in prison and awarded a cost of GH¢1,000 against each of them.