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Parliament ready to consider new land bill - Minister
Accra, April 9, Ghanadot/GNA - A bill to
establish a new Lands Commission with all land agencies
under it to make land transaction easy is currently before
Parliament for consideration, Madam Esther Obeng Dappah,
Minister of Lands, Forestry and Mines, announced on Tuesday
in Accra.
Consequently, she said, negotiations for the construction of
a new office building for the Land Agency have been
completed.
“The success of land administration in the country depends
largely on an effective administrative set up at the local
level,” Madam Dappah explained at the meet-the-press series
in Accra on Tuesday.
“For this reason, the Ministry would conduct a study and
come up with recommendations for effective and sustainable
management of the customary Land Secretariat now being
established,” she said.
Presenting the performance of the land, forestry and mines
sectors since 2001, Madam Dapaah said there was now some
order in the administration of land since the previous
system of fragmented land sector agencies with entrenched
identities performing overlapping and duplicating functions
had given way to an efficient and cost effective one-stop
corporate organization that reduced time and cost of land
registration.
She said about 32.7 per cent of the backlog of cases on land
litigation at the courts had been cleared. Ten customary
land secretariats, one in each region, had been established
to reduce insecurity in land tenure and avoid multiple sale
of land.
In addition, land banks for investments in various parts of
the country had been identified, documented, published and
information disseminated to provide ready access to land,
the Deputy Minister said.
Madam Dappah said the transaction cost and turn around time
in title/deed registration have also been reduced
considerably from 36 months to two months by the
establishment of seven deed registries in Koforidua, Tamale,
Sunyani, Sekondi, Bolgatanga, Ho and Wa in addition to the
existing ones in Accra and Kumasi. She said the registry for
the Cape Coast would be completed and inaugurated by the end
of this month.
Challenges being faced in the on-going reforms under land
administration, the Deputy Minister said, include “how to
ensure the sustainability of the customary land secretariats
being established”.
She said she was worry about whether the traditional
authorities managing these secretariats would continue to
financially support the secretariats when the land
administration project came to a close. These secretariats
are now being supported by government and other development
partners.
GNA
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