Mrs. Joana Quaye, the ex-wife of Ghanaian businessman and self-acclaimed billionaire Richard Nii Armah Quaye (RNAQ), has filed an application for injunction at the Divorce and Matrimonial Division of the High Court in Accra seeking to restrain him from selling, transferring, disposing of or in any way alienating shares in a long list of companies, luxury vehicles, and expensive properties until an appeal over their divorce settlement is finally determined.  

The embattled ex-wife of RNAQ is asking the court to temporarily ‘freeze’ the disputed assets and shares owned by the couple in various companies acquired during the course of the marriage  in order to prevent the businessman from disposing of them before the Court of Appeal decides whether she is entitled to a larger share of the wealth acquired during their marriage. 

Contribution to formation of business

In an explosive affidavit in support of an application filed on her behalf by Dame & Partners, her new lawyers, Joana Quaye narrates a relationship stretching back to 2002 when both parties had just completed secondary school, eventually culminating in marriage in 2010. She claims she sacrificed her education, worked multiple jobs, and financially supported Richard Nii Armah Quaye’s studies and early entrepreneurial ambitions including funding that  contributed to the birth of Quick Credit Company Limited, now Bills Micro-Credit. Relying on documents she had earlier tendered at the trial as exhibits, Joana Quaye indicated that in anticipation of their marriage, she opened a joint account with RNAQ at SG-SSB Ltd and subsequently, jointly invested the funds from that account in an investment transaction operated by Data Bank Ltd. This investment matured and was redeemed by the couple in 2008 and was given to RNAQ who utilised it to fund his travel to the United Kingdom in 2008 to pursue further education in Accounting.

According to Joana Quaye, when RNAQ returned from the UK the following year in 2009, he was unemployed. They started exploring means of setting up a business for him. She closed her personal bank account by withdrawing all her savings and they used same as seed money to start a micro-finance enterprise in 2010 – the same year in which they got married – which the couple named Quick Credit, within six months after the Respondent had returned from the UK. Joana Quaye

History of ownership of shares in companies

Joana Quaye further stated that a year after they had gotten married, in 2011, they jointly set up a company called Quick Micro Credit and Investment Limited (unilaterally renamed Bills Micro Credit by RNAQ subsequently). Together with RNAQ, she was an original shareholder in Quick Micro Credit and Investment Limited. She was also, together with RNAQ, the only two directors of the company. According to Joana Quaye, without her knowledge or consent, RNAQ altered the records of the company by removing Joana Quaye as both director and shareholder of the company around 2021. Mrs. Quaye alleges that RNAQ admitted this under cross-examination in the course of the trial of the divorce case. In her view, therefore, the “conclusions of the learned judge were arbitrary, discriminatory and a complete departure from the principles governing the equitable distribution of marital property upon the dissolution of marriage”. According to her, all assets acquired in the subsistence of marriage, including shares in companies, are martial property liable to be “distributed equitably, irrespective of whether there was an agreement between the parties or not.”  

The application lists an eye-popping catalogue of disputed assets, including shareholding interests in Quick Credit, Quick Angels, Waterfall Engineering, Tigon Entertainment, Ridge Medical Centre, CEQA Foods, and several other companies. Also named are luxury homes at Trasacco Estates, East Legon, Dansoman, and Mamprobi, alongside a fleet of high-end vehicles including a Rolls Royce Phantom, Bentley Coupe, Mercedes Benz G-Wagon, Range Rover Vogue, Range Rover Velar, and Lexus 4×4.  Joana Quaye argues that these assets were acquired during the subsistence of the marriage and therefore ought to be equitably distributed. She seeks to restrain RNAQ from disposing or transferring them before the final determination of her appeal.

Justification for freeze of RNAQ’s shares in other companies

Mrs. Quaye contends that the formation of Quick Credit by the couple and their joint ownership of shares in that company was “the springboard for RNAQ’s wealth and acquisition of various properties by him”. According to her, RNAQ used Quick Credit and Quick Angels to acquire other companies. He also “deployed the companies as a vehicle for the acquisition of various immovable and movable properties”. She claimed that most of the vehicles acquired during the marriage are in the name of companies owned by RNAQ and other companies which are in turn owned by companies set up during the subsistence of the marriage.

Mrs. Quaye urges the court that there is a pressing need for the court to restrain RNAQ from disposing of the assets because he has demonstrated an ability to unlawfully transfer assets acquired during marriage. She cites his act in transferring her shares in Quick Credit Limited, without her knowledge, as an example, emphasising that she became aware only when RNAQ admitted this fact under cross-examination in court

Joana Quaye accuses the businessman of having caused the breakdown of the marriage through “unbridled cheating with many women” and that she suffered severe physical violence during the marriage. She further alleges that complaints she lodged with the Ghana Police Service never saw the “light of day” due to interference by powerful persons allegedly acting on behalf of the RNAQ. In another bombshell claim, she states that the RNAQ currently lives in the Trasacco residence with another woman whom she describes as one of several girlfriends maintained during the marriage. 

Unfairness and violations by the trial judge

The affidavit of Mrs Quaye also raises serious procedural and constitutional questions about the original divorce judgment delivered on the 20th January 2026. According to Joana Quaye, the full written judgment was unavailable for more than three months and only surfaced after her constitutional right of appeal had expired. She argues that there appeared to be “two versions” of the judgment, one containing the final orders and another containing the reasons for the orders released  after the expiry of the three-month period within which she was entitled to appeal, a situation she says violated her constitutional rights. She laments that if her new lawyers, Dame & Partners, had not promptly appealed when the full judgment was not available, she would have suffered irremediable damage.

Joana Quaye is asking the High Court to preserve all the contested assets pending appeal, warning that any transfer or disposal of the properties could cause irreparable injustice and leave her with an “empty legal shell” even if she eventually wins the appeal.  

The high-profile dispute is expected to ignite national debate about marital property, women’s contribution to wealth creation in marriages, and the extent to which spouses are entitled to fortunes built during long-term relationships.

See the injunction below: