CO129-377 - Governor Sir Lugard - 1911 [5] — Page 298

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Fortunately nothing of the

whom the undertaking was entered into. sort happened, and so far as one can judge the adherents seem to have been satisfied that the Government has kept faith, and that the pro portions allotted to each were equitable from the standpoint of each. There is no evidence that such was the case, but it might well be that this very question which is raised between non adherents, should have been raised among adherents; and i have no hesitation in saying that if the question whether the complete ignoring or back section holders had been so raised, they would have been entitled to a patient hearing, and further, that even if there had only becu one, he would have been entitied, without prejudice to the rest or the scheme proceeding, to have hai the question which is raised in this action very seriously considereu by the Government, and if necessary by the Law Officers at home. hur I wish to say this at ouce: that it is a very senous question, and one notį to be so easily assumed adversely to the back section holders as seems to have been done by the Guvernment in this case. But certainly; Chu Chuen, and there are indications that others in similar circumstances held back during the preliminary negotiations, probably for the very goo reason that they wanted to see how the Government would deal wit them, had a right to much more consideration than be in fact received.

But, in view of the way in which the Government handled the scheme, the position of Chu Chuen and others in like circumstances altered after the passing of the Ordinance. They found themselves in a cielt stick. The Ordinance provided-again I must say, not from the terms of the preamble to s. 8, but trom the fact that the plan which had received legislative sanction showed no others-that only frontagers should share in the reclaimed laud, and that back section noiders--even

such an extreme case as Chu Chuen who held only 1/5th of the front age, but almost 3/4ths of the whole lot-were to be entirely ignored. But 1 deur entirely to the argument that he had no right to protest; and 1 say deliberately that he nad at least the right to have the question considered and decided, whether the subdivision of Marine Lot 53A made by the pian was, to use the phrase which the Government adheres to, an" equitable proportion "-to use the more accurate teim, was just. My learned predecessor in his judgment in the other case, in the Full Court himsont anys, equitable proportion meant so much as a Court of Equity would give." may be entirely wrong in even thinking that the question is arguable: put at the lowest, it is a question on which different people may think differently; one of the Government officers ideel thought this contention was sound, but at least the Government ought to have treated his protest with less scant courtesy than they did, and a timely reference to the Law Officers at home would have saved this troublesome and very costly litigation,

But the Government decided not to do this: they stuck to their Ordinance, or rather to the plan authorised by the Ordinance, and we have only now to deal with the rights of Chu Chuen's executors, and those of Yiu Chow's successors in title, under that plan as authorised by the Ordinance.

The examination of the details of the working of the scheme as sanctioned by the Ordinance results in the following:-The acquisition of the rights by the lessees to share in the reclaimed land was subject to a hard and tast rule which the Government could not depart from: the portions of land were specifically indicated by the plan, and could not be varied:-1 use the word rights, but it is not quite exact, because the grants were only to be made if the Governor thought ft.

But no question turns on this, and for convenience I call them the rights acquired by those lessees who accepted the plan. No one else had any right or semblance of right at all If any lessee did not choose to cousent his existing rights were sacrificed to the public good, and he was not even given a right to compensation for depreciation of his property, though the Governor might grant such compensation. It results from this very clearly that if there were any reclaimed land not granted by reason of any of the lessees standing out, it belonged to Government, and To 13 one else, and the Government had no right to deal with it in any other way than it deals with other Government land. This indeed is expressly provided by s. 6 of the Ordinnace. Also there is another thing which stands out clearly, that the Government by accepting the titles indicated by the Land Office Registry were not authorised to meddle with any disputes of title.

I now turn to what happened in the case of Marine Lot 53A, the frontage of which was held as to sections B and D by Yiu Chow, the assignees of Chu Chuen, and by Chu Chuen as to the "Remaining Portion."

First, I take the story as it appears from the documents. The Government Notice of 6th July, 1889, issued under s. 8 (2) was put in, and a tracing of so much of the deposited plan which shows that the reclamation in front of the sections was divided into two portions, the Praya frontage of which corresponded with the Praya frontage of the los itself. Fut shortly, all the reclamation in front of sections B and D) was allotted to Yin Chow, and so much only (a narrow strip) as was in front of the Remaining Portion was allotted to Chu Chuen. Those were the frontages according to the Land Office Register and that was how

it was proposed to divide the reclamation in front of the lot.

This notification being an invitation to the lessees to accept, Chu Chuen on 17th July addressed a letter to Government requesting

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