Lands Commission Assures Ghanaians To Remove Bottlenecks And Ensure Effective Land Administration in Ghana
The Acting Executive Secretary of Lands Commission, Mr. James Kobina Dadson, has stated that proactive measures had been put in place to address bottlenecks hampering effective land administration and management in the country.
Freeman Koryekpor Awlesu Greater 
The Acting Executive Secretary of Lands Commission, Mr. James Kobina Dadson, has stated that proactive measures had been put in place to address bottlenecks hampering effective land administration and management in the country.
He said part of the measures being taken include decentralization, digitalization, staff capacity building, infrastructure development, and adoption of best practices such as operationalization of site-plan and addressing challenges regarding land compensations.
The Executive Secretary was speaking at a closing ceremony of a five-day management retreat in Accra on Friday, March 18, 2022, organized the land Commission under the theme: “Achieving Institutional excellence land services delivery through modern technology, human resource development, and private participation.”
Mr. Dadson expects that the outcomes of these reforms would result in a total transformation of land service delivery by the Commission.
“Initially, we are talking about digitalization as the government's main focus but we have gone beyond that. We are looking at total reform of our sector and digitalization is key. One of the elements that we are embarking on, we have operated in a typically manual environment, and we are migrating our records from manual to digital.”
According to him, land can be registered in the same region that it was acquired, adding that by the next 12 months, the Commission’s district office in Tema in the Greater Accra Region will be fully operational.
He stated categorically that the chiefs and the traditional authorities manage over 80 percent of all the lands in the country, but “we are only doing the registration on their behalf.
"And so occasionally we embark on public education campaigns, we go to the house of chiefs, now that we have a new land Act we started having sessions with the various Houses of Chiefs, engage other stakeholders including the media practitioners," he explained.
The Executive Secretary added that every region has a commission and the board has a representative of the Regional House of Chiefs who reports and sends feedback to the chiefs.
He also refuted the allegation that the Commission is the cause of many land disputes in the country, explaining that if Teshie in Accra registers a land and neighboring community, the people in La Traditional Area in Accra goes to court and secures judgment in its, the Commission cannot be blamed for it.
For his part, the Deputy Executive Secretary of the Commission, MrJones Ofori Boadu also blamed part of the land problems on the country’s outdated map, which has been in use since 1974.
“It is part of the problem we are facing in managing our lands in Ghana. If you don’t have to date map every record on land sits on the map. The map is the base on which every record sits. So if you don’t have to date map, then it translates to the incurrent of some of the records.
“So that is why it is very critical to have up-to-date maps because whatever we have on paper should relate to exactly whatever is on the ground. And if you don’t have that you always have over lapses and you will always have disputes when it comes to land administration.”
He indicated that part of the reforming ongoing is the engagement of the Price Waterhouse Coopers to look at the financial capacity of the Lands Commission.
The staff of the Lands Commission at the event
