When a Lawyer makes an application in court, it can either be MOTION ON NOTICE, that is to say an application telling the other party that you want the court to grant a relief, which he may or may not oppose, or, MOTION EX PARTE, which is an application without notice to the other party.
To this, let me add my own: we have DEATH EX PARTE and DEATH ON NOTICE. Death is on Notice when you are sick in hospital or at home for a long time, and your condition is getting worse by the day. My father-in-law’s daughter’s cousin, a very big wig in the Ministry of Education, very recently passed away into eternity after a hectic battle with sickness for three months. We will bury her on November 5, 2022, at Aburi.
However, DEATH EX PARTE is when all of a sudden, absolutely without any notice whatsoever, a person suddenly drops dead, either through sleep or a sudden bout of sickness, heart failure, and so on.
According to the late famous Lawyer, E.D. Kumi, in this our part of the world, where the average life expectancy is about 60 years, anybody who clocks 60 should be on notice that you are on your way home!!!
And so I don’t think anybody, in this world, was surprised to hear in the news that Her Royal Majesty Queen Elizabeth II had received a writ of summons to appear before Almighty God at the ripe old age of 96 years!!!!
The good aspect of Death on Notice is that it puts everybody on hold, on tenterhooks, planning silently as to how the funeral should be organised, if and when the inevitable happens.
According to history, the greatest ever funeral in human memory was the funeral of ALEXANDER THE GREAT, who was buried by a 1,000 Army man strong catafalque guard that snaked across Asia with the corpse, from Babylon to its final resting place – is it Alexandria???
Watching the funeral of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth on television, I remembered so well what my good friend, Hon Kofi Attoh, then Member of Parliament (MP) for Ho Central, told me in Parliament one day – he told me, surprisingly, that he was not going to the Independence Square for the swearing in ceremony of the new President, J.A. Kufuor – why Kofi?
“But Effah, it is better and clearer to watch proceedings on television – if you are there, your line of vision is limited, but at home, or in the office, on TV the cameras bring you a vivid coverage of everything…
How so true!!!
There on the TV screen was President Joe Bidden arriving in the special US President car “The Beast” which President George Bush and President Barrack Obama brought to Ghana during their respective state visits.
I hear some foreign sympathisers were driven in a bus to the place where the casket was laid, and there was the new Monarch, King Charles III, and all the eight grand children of the fallen Monarch.
Interesting – she was not buried in a cemetery or a Royal Mausoleum or in a vault, but INSIDE St George Chapel at Windsor Castle – beside her husband, Philip, her father, mother, and sister… that is British Royalty for you.
But, permit me to ask – when our President, Professor John Atta Mills, died, the British Monarch did not attend his funeral in Accra, neither did the British Premier at the time. So, why did we lower all flags in Ghana at half mast for the death of the Head of State of another country for seven days!!!
Interestingly – I did not see the Chinese leader, Xi Zinping, and the Russian Warlord – Vladimir Putin. Of course, the Ukraine leader, in his accustomed green T-shirt, was busily creating restless problems at his doorsteps!!!!
The world is really very interesting. Nothing changes, except the players – a long Kaleidoscope football match…
Written by Nkrabeah Effah-Dartey
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect The Chronicle’s stance.
