“Clear The Mess At Lands Commission” – President Akufo-Addo Charges New Board

The President of the Republic, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, has charged the newly constituted Board of the National Lands Commission to clear the mess at the Commission, and ensure that the process of acquisition and use of land is not cumbersome, and is governed by law.

According to President Akufo-Addo, “on a daily basis, and I know I am not alone in making this observation, we hear of countless lamentations from many Ghanaians, who face great difficulty in trying to access services at the Lands Commission.”

The processes of procuring land, and registering land titles, the President said, are fraught with so much bureaucracy and so much corruption.

He noted that, for example, to conduct a simple search of the details of a parcel of land, before making final payment to the owners, is a process that takes weeks, and, if you are not lucky, months.

“Even at that, one would have to part with some amount of money before the search is conducted at the Lands Commission. After receiving the details of the search, and satisfying oneself about the genuineness or otherwise of the land, then comes another nightmare – registration of the land title,” the President said.

He continued, “We have heard on several occasions about mysterious disappearances of indentures and other land title documents from the Lands Commission, only for them to be replaced with documents belonging to others. If you are lucky enough to have your documents remaining intact at the Commission, registering a piece of land can take years.”

President Akufo-Addo made this known on Thursday, August 24, 2017, when the inaugurated the newly Board of the National Lands Commission.

“Indeed, it appears that, for the right amount of money, any transaction, legal or illegal, can be procured at the Lands Commission. It is deeply regrettable that the very problems that led to the establishment of the Lands Commission and the implementation of a land administration reform programme, through the Land Administration Projects, still persist,” he said.

This, he stressed, is not right, and this has to end.

The President told the Board that the Ghanaian people were dissatisfied with the direction in which this country was headed, and, thus, voted to change course and give them a Ghana where systems work, and where shady acts, such as those taking place at the Lands Commission, are curtailed.

Source: otecfmghana.com