Bad judgements fuel land disputes — Records, research study show

RECORDS available at the Lands Commission and other research conducted on land in Ghana show that bad court judgements delivered in some land cases have accentuated conflicts in many areas.
The administrative mechanisms for registering such judgements tended to be fraught with challenges as a result of the open-ended descriptions of the lands in question, pre-recorded transactions in favour of other owners who were not parties to the disputes, non-scientific plans attached to judgements, among others.
These were brought to the fore in Accra at a round-table discussion organised by the Ghana Centre for Democratic Development (CDD-Ghana) on the topic: “Enhancing Good Governance and the Development Effects of Judicial Decisions on Land”.
Participants were officials of the Lands Commission, members of the Judiciary and traditional rulers.
In his presentation, Mr Sulemana Mahama, the Chief Lands Officer at the Lands Commission, said problems associated with land included delays in dispensing cases, compulsory acquisition and national development agenda, some impact of judicial decision, weakened customary control of land, opportunistic land sales and mass invasion on public land.
Mr Mahama said the basis for Ghana’s socio-economic development, political and social harmony hinged, to a great extent, on land and, therefore, issues of land must be treated with the seriousness they deserved.
He indicated that recent statistics suggested that close to 73 per cent of sector contribution of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) emanated from land-related productive activities, while up to 80 per cent of land holding was held in customary tenure, with agriculture accounting for more than 60 per cent of employment.
He, therefore, suggested the need to ensure continuous judicial and stakeholder education and engagement.
In his comment, a lecturer at the Law Faculty of the University of Ghana, Mr Kwame Gyan, said officials at the Lands Commission were to be blamed in some of the land-related litigation, explaining that some of them intentionally gave out wrong reports to benefit those they wanted to please.
The Executive Director of CDD-Ghana, Professor E. Gyima-Boadu, said the sources of the endemic problem of land and landed property insecurity and chaos were likely to be many but the official adjudication bodies, including the Judiciary, were most likely to be implicated directly or indirectly.
He, therefore, called for a mechanism which would enable issues involving land to be resolved amicably, since land and land-based resources represented crucial productive assets.
The Chairman for the occasion, Justice S. A Brobbey, said since land was considered one of the most important items in the life of man, anything to do with it must be done with care in order not to create problems in society.