Many people who have attempted to acquire or to register a piece of land for residential, commercial, or agricultural purposes in Ghana agree that existing systems require improvement.
Land buyers have complained that the land market is characterized by general indiscipline, difficult access to land, multiple sales, frequent litigation and a weak land administration regime. Some investors have grumbled about inadequate security of tenure and conflicts of interests between and within stools, skins, families and clans. These constraints are well documented in the National Land Policy.
In the foreword to the 1999 National Land Policy document, Dr. Christina Amoako-Nuama, then Minister for Lands and Natural Resources indicated that the land policy sought to address fundamental problems associated with land administration and management in the country. Dr. Amoako-Nuama specified that the main objective of the policy was to ensure judicious use of the nation’s land and natural resources to support socio-economic activities in accordance with sustainable resource management principles while maintaining viable ecosystems. Unfortunately, the objectives haven’t been achieved after 25years of implementation due to human factors such environmental degradation through mining, deforestation, blatant disregard for development and planning schemes and the effects of climate change.
In order to overcome existing challenges to land administration in Ghana, John Mahama proposes to review and update the 25-year-old National Land Policy in his next administration in order to make it more responsive to the times as part of the Building-the-Ghana-We-Want-Together policy. The objective of the revised policy would be to encourage efficient and equitable land resource distribution, and affordable access to land for housing and other developmental initiatives in conformism with the Land Act 2020 (Act 1036), and the Land Use and Spatial Planning Act 2016 (Act 925). Apart from reviewing and upgrading the old land policy to international standard, the Mahama in his next administration proposes to improve customary land administration which he believes, would cut back land conflicts and litigation that have clogged the Ghanaian court system. John Mahama appreciates the fact that the growing frequency of litigation in our law courts have contributed largely to the slow disposal of court cases and also the fact that land related conflicts have stalled both private and public development projects and compounded the Ghana’s struggle to attract foreign investment. Therefore, under the next Mahama government, customary land authorities should expect structured support from central government – where customary land authorities would be incentivized to survey and map-out their boarders for the production of boundary plans that would be registered. This Mahama believes would help sanitize customary land management and administration by traditional authorities to attract investment whiles bolstering land tenure security.
John Mahama proposes to set up a Presidential Commission to tackle protracted land problems and contests instigated by overlapping claims and conflicting court judgments, return of acquired and vested lands to original owners as well as the payment of compensation claims to stools, families and clans.
Citizens should expect improvements in service delivery by state land agencies such as the Lands Commission, the Office of the Administrator of Stool Lands, the Land Use and Spatial Planning Authority, and the Geological Survey Authority. Starting with the Greater Accra Region, John Mahama proposes to introduce a Citizens Service Delivery Charter to streamline and publish service delivery timelines with an ambitious target of a 30-day turn-around time for land title registration and a 20-day turn-around time for the registration of mortgages among others.
The current public land allocation regime would be reviewed and revised to with a framework that restores trust, confidence and transparency while eliminating abuse of administrative power by public office holders and political appointees. Issues relating to large-scale, land-acquisition would be reviewed to safeguard the rights of women, the youth and vulnerable groups and address inefficiencies and inequities with land resource allocation.
These proposals would be fused into the Building-The-Ghana-We-Want-Together, policy – to build the Ghana, where the vulnerable including women and the youth are protected and empowered, the Ghana, where public lands are secure, the Ghana, where land service delivery compares to that in forward-looking economies, the Ghana, with minimal land litigation and the Ghana, where land serves to propel social transformation and economic growth for all.
The Author, Gad A. Akwensivie is a Land Expert
