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Course Overview and Academic Framework

  • Academic Institution: Central University, Faculty of Law.
  • Lecturer: Eunice Appiah-Asare.
  • Target Academic Levels: Level 100 and Level 200.
  • Courses Covered:
    • LAW 105: Law of Contract I (3 Credits, Semester 1, 2021/2022 Academic Year).
    • LAW 106: Law of Contract II (3 Credits, Semester 2, 2020/2021 Academic Year).
  • Professional and Statutory Accreditation:
    • Designed to fulfill explicit requirements of the Bachelor of Laws (LL.B.) degree.
    • Tailored to satisfy the requirements for the Qualified Certificate of Law awarded by the General Legal Council for admission to legal practice in Ghana.
  • Core Pedagogical Objectives:
    • Impart practical and theoretical knowledge of Ghanaian contract law.
    • Enable students to establish what constitutes an enforceable, legally binding agreement.
    • Examine vitiating elements that compromise, distort, or invalidate legal consent.
    • Articulate the societal aims, policy goals, and socioeconomic functions underpinning contract jurisprudence.
    • Provide rigorous preparation for success in LL.B. academic and professional licensing examinations.
  • Instructional Methodology:
    • Blended learning incorporating interactive online and physical in-class lectures.
    • Small-group tutorial sessions designed for problem-solving and analysis.
    • Formal student-led case presentations and structured debates.
    • Mandated advance reading of relevant cases, statutory provisions, and doctrinal treatises.

Assessment and Grading Scheme

  • Attendance and Participation: 5%5\% (Evaluated across lectures and tutorial sessions).
  • Presentations: 5%5\% (Oral delivery, doctrinal synthesis, and response to critique).
  • Quizzes: 10%10\% (Periodic formative assessments across foundational topics).
  • Mid-Semester Examinations: 20%20\% (Interim summative assessment).
  • End of Semester Examinations: 60%60\% (Comprehensive final examination).
  • Total Course Grade: 100%100\%

LAW 105: Law of Contract I Curriculum

  • Weeks 1 & 2: Introduction to the Law of Contract in Ghana

    • General introduction to the law of contract: nature and characteristics of legally binding agreements.
    • Doctrinal and policy focus of contract law within the Ghanaian legal framework.
    • Theoretical concepts of contract law as an exchange mechanism and bargain.
    • Nature of contractual obligations: distinguishing promises, undertakings, and enforceable covenants.
    • Classification of contracts (unilateral, bilateral, formal, simple, express, implied).
    • Essential elements of a valid contract: agreement, intention, capacity, consideration, and form.
    • Nature of mutual agreement and the objective test used by courts for ascertaining agreement.
    • Required Readings: Dowuona-Hammond, C. (2011), The Law of Contract in Ghana; Contracts Act, 1960 (Act 25).

  • Weeks 3, 4 & 5: Offer and Acceptance

    • Nature and legal definition of an offer.
    • Distinguishing an offer from an invitation to treat (advertisements, displays of goods, catalogues, auctions, tenders).
    • Acceptance: criteria for absolute, unqualified assent.
    • Counter-offers: effects on the original offer; conditional acceptances.
    • Communication of acceptance: general receipt rule, instantaneous communications, and exceptions (e.g., postal rule).
    • Termination of an offer: revocation, rejection, lapse of time, failure of a condition precedent, death of parties.
    • Battle of the forms: conflicting standard terms in corporate and commercial contracting.
    • Required Readings: Dowuona-Hammond, C. (2011), The Law of Contract in Ghana; Sale of Goods Act, 1962 (Act 137), section 4 (1) (a) (b) (c); Electronic Transaction Act, 2008 (Act 772).

  • Week 6: Intention to Create Legal Relations

    • Introduction to legal intent and the legal enforceability threshold.
    • Agreements made in domestic and social settings:
    • Agreements between husband and wife.
    • Agreements between parent and child.
    • General social agreements and rebuttable presumptions.
    • Agreements made in commercial settings: presumption of legal relations, honor clauses, and rebuttal burdens.
    • Required Readings: Dowuona-Hammond, C. (2011), The Law of Contract in Ghana; Bondzi-Simpson, P. E. (2002), Law of Contract.

  • Week 7: Capacity to Contract

    • Contractual capacity: definitions and baseline requirements.
    • Minors: common law rules, contracts for necessaries, beneficial contracts of service, voidable and void agreements.
    • Mentally incompetent persons: standard of incapacity, knowledge requirement of the other party, and validation rules.
    • Drunken or intoxicated persons: legal consequences, degree of impairment, and subsequent ratification upon sobriety.
    • Required Readings: Dowuona-Hammond, C. (2011), The Law of Contract in Ghana; Bondzi-Simpson, P. E. (2002), Law of Contract.

  • Weeks 8 & 9: Consideration

    • Doctrinal definition and historical foundations of consideration.
    • Kinds of consideration: executory, executed, and past consideration.
    • Traditional common law rules governing consideration (sufficiency versus adequacy, moving from the promisee, performance of existing legal/contractual duties).
    • Exceptions to the traditional rules.
    • Statutory reforms in Ghana modifying common law consideration rules under the Contracts Act, 1960 (Act 25), Sections 8, 9, and 10.
    • The equitable doctrine of Promissory Estoppel: elements, shield versus sword application, suspensory versus extinctive effects.
    • Required Readings: Dowuona-Hammond, C. (2011), The Law of Contract in Ghana; Contracts Act, 1960 (Act 25), Sections 8, 9 & 10; Date-Bah, S. K. (1973), "The Doctrine of Consideration and the Modification of Contracts", 5 R.G.L. 1047.

  • Week 10: Privity of Contract

    • The traditional common law doctrine of privity.
    • General common law rules precluding third parties from enforcing benefits or bearing burdens.
    • The statutory abolition and reform of the common law position in Ghana.
    • Specific legislative mechanisms for third-party rights enforcement under the Contracts Act, 1960 (Act 25).
    • Required Readings: Dowuona-Hammond, C. (2011), The Law of Contract in Ghana; Contracts Act, 1960 (Act 25).

  • Weeks 11 & 12: Terms of Contract

    • Defining contractual terms: distinguishing terms from mere representations and puffs.
    • Classification of terms: conditions, warranties, and innominate/intermediate terms.
    • Standard form contracts and exemption clauses.
    • Limitation clauses versus exclusion/exemption clauses: rules of incorporation, contra proferentem construction, and statutory limits.
    • Fundamental breach of contract and its interaction with exclusion clauses.
    • Required Readings: Dowuona-Hammond, C. (2011), The Law of Contract in Ghana.

LAW 106: Law of Contract II Curriculum

  • Weeks 1 & 2: Vitiating Factors – Misrepresentation
    • Definition of misrepresentation: actionable statements of fact versus opinions, statements of intention, or silence.
    • General requirements: false representation of material existing fact inducing entry into the agreement.
    • Exceptions to the general rule on silence: contracts uberrimae fidei, half-truths, change of circumstances, fiduciary relationships.
    • Kinds of misrepresentation:
    • Fraudulent misrepresentation (Derry v Peek standard).
    • Negligent misrepresentation (common law tort of negligent misstatement and statutory liability).
    • Wholly innocent misrepresentation.
    • Legal remedies: rescission (and bars to rescission), damages in tort and under contract law.
    • Required Readings: Dowuona-Hammond, C. (2011), The Law of Contract in Ghana; Bondzi-Simpson, P. E.