LAND ADMINISTRATION PROBLEMS IN NIGERIA:

CASE STUDIES OF OYO AND NIGER STATES

*Wole Morenikeji; ** Dayo Ayorinde and * Gideon Owoyele

* Urban and Regional Planning Department, Federal University of Technology, Minna

**Ministry of Land, Housing and Physical Planning, Ibadan

ABSTRACT

The paper examined the practices of land administration in – Oyo and Niger States,

in the light of the Land Use Decree of 1978. The paper observed that land

administration in both states is wrought with problems such as inability of the states

to meet the land requirements of the public, cumbersome process of getting the

right-of-occupancy, frequent changing of public officers, poor record-keeping,

inability of government to pay compensation in respect of acquired land, among

others. These problems in turn were found to have contributed to physical planning

problems. In spite of the decree, it was found that illegal land transactions are still

going on in both states and there is constant conflict between the local government

authorities and the town planning department over the allocation of plots and use of

land. The paper therefore called for an urgent review of the appropriate section of

the decree to allow genuine property developers to have access to larger plots of

land, intensification of planning education at the local government level,

encouragement of staff training in the field of Geographical Information System

(G.I.S) among others.

INTRODUCTION

Land, though ubiquitous, is fixed in quality and, like any other goods of economic

utility, is affected by the laws of demand and supply. The demand by both the public

and private users of land for various uses such as residential, transportation,

commercials, institutional and agricultural in both urban and rural centres require that

land must be made available at the right time, in the right quantity and quality and at

the right places. Thus, the issue of who controls the land is very crucial to land

development activities.

Prior to the promulgation of the Land Use Decree of 1978 in Nigeria, there were no

uniform land administration system. In Northern Nigeria, land was communally

owned and vacant plots were allocated by the Chief or the Emir in whom the land

was vested. No individual had absolute title to land. The traditional ruler held all land

in trust for the use of the whole community. In Southern Nigeria, a kind of dualism

existed in the ownership and control of land in which some parts or the land in a

community were owned by individual families and others reserved for grazing,

hunting, civic use etc. was held in trust for the community and administered by the

traditional-ruler the Oba.

The system being practiced in the Northern Nigeria was akin to the 1978 Land Use

Decree hence the decree is relatively successful in the North. For instance the Kano

State Urban Development Board Edict (No.5 of 1976) and the Land Use Decree of

1978 are complimentary and both have enhanced the practice of land use planning

and administration in the state. In the South, though most land were held under

private trust, such land were often subdivided in to layouts which were then

approved by the town planning authorities before the plots were sold to individuals.

The Land Use Decree was therefore “the culmination of government effort to

streamline the land tenure system” in the country (Ola, 1984). It represented, as

commented by James (1987) a shift from the colonially inspired laissez fair policy of

“dualism” in the Southern States to one of “trusteeship”, and in the Northern States,

a modification of the inherited policy of “paternalism” to accord with the “trusteeship”

policy.

The decree, among other things, puts all land in urban areas under the control and

management of the governor of each state and all other land under the Local

Government in which the land is situated. The governor working through the Land

Use and Allocation Committee has the power to grant statutory rights of occupancy

to any person for all purposes while the Local Government working through Land

Allocation Advisory Committee has the power to grant customary rights of

occupancy.

The state now has the power to compulsorily acquire land anywhere. The decree

makes provision for the payment of appropriate compensation, though not for the

land per-se, but for the development on land, for instance, buildings and economic

trees. To own a plot of land which is not more than 0.5 hectare in urban areas and

500 hectares and 5000 hectares, respectively for farming and grazing in rural areas

per individual, a statutory Right of Occupancy and Customary Right of Occupancy

must first be obtained from the government respectively with regard to urban and

rural land. This paper makes an attempt to examine the processes involved in

securing land for various uses in two different socio-political environment vis-à-vis

the provision of the Land Use Decree and then to appraise the effects of the Decree

on physical planning in Nigeria.

EVALUATION OF LAND ADMINISTRATION PROCESS

Public ownership of land has been justified (Brocklebank et al 1972) on the ground

that it would make for:

1. Easier access to and availability of land for development when and where it is

needed,

2. Increased efficiency of land use management through better planning,

3. Greater social justice in the distribution of land resources,

4. Control of land values and process and thereby land speculations,

5. Maintenance of a healthy, sanitary environment, and

6. Insurance of security of tenure.

It is against this background that success or failure of land reforms and

administration can be evaluated. Observations in many countries, especially the

developing countries, have shown the lofty objectives of land administration

instruments, such as Nigeria’s Land Use Decree, are hardly achieved. Only in few

countries are modest achievements made. Farvacque and McAuslan (1992) have

identified, in their comprehensive study, a number of problems militating against

successful land policies, these are:

1. Over centralization of management and administration.

2. Inappropriate, over detailed and inflexible regulatory and legal frameworks.

3. Lack of inappropriate use of resources and political will to tackle problems,

4. Administrative systems lacking in efficiency, equity, accountability and probity,

5. Failure or reluctance to encourage participation from the urban poor.

The authors further note that the journey toward the lawful acquisition of a plot of

land is a long and confusing one. Access to land, registration of land and permission

to develop the land involve time consuming, unduly cumbersome, and costly

procedures. This fact is buttressed by the examples of Peru and Cameroon. In Peru,

the authors note that the process of adjudication process of state lands takes about

43 months and is the result of 207 bureaucratic steps involveing 48 different

government offices and in Cameroon only 100,000 (6%) plots out of an estimated

1,600,00 plots country wide are registered because of cumbersome registration

process that takes between two to seven years and lack of properly maintained

cadastral maps.

The nature of the problems of land administration in Nigeria is bound to vary from

one region to the other despite the existence of uniform Land Use Decree. The

reason, as mentioned earlier, is because the two major component regions (North

and South) in the country were operating in and accustomed to, two distinct land

tenure system before the coming of the Land Use Decree. It is the objective of this

paper to examine the operation of the system of land administration in Niger State

(Northern Nigeria) and Oyo State (Southern Nigeria) with a view to identifying the

problems and the effects of these problems on development control in the two

states.

METHODOLOGY

For the analysis and discussions, data and the relevant information were

collected from the records of the former Ibadan Metropolitan Planning Authority, Oyo

State Ministry of Lands, Housing and Survey, Niger State Ministry of Works (Lands

and Town Planning Department). Secondary data were collected from earlier works

and government publications in the two states.

RESULTS

Processing Certificate of Occupancy (C of O.) in Oyo State, Southern Nigeria

The C. of O. duly signed by the governor of the state where the land in question is

located confer statutory right of occupancy on the possessor and this entitles the

owner right to use the land for a period of 99 yeaars after which the C. of O. can be

renewed or the land revert back to the state. In Oyo State, the application for C. of O.

must be accompanied by applicant’s receipts of development levy for three years, a

three year tax clearance certificate, a photocopy of deed of conveyance (evidence of

title), original copy of survey plan and original land agreement.

These requirements raise a fundamental observation. By demanding for deed

of conveyance and original land agreement, it implies that transaction in land is

recognized to be taking place on individual to individual basis rather than

individual/government basis. The true situation is that, although the Decree made

allowance for all land transactions that had taken place prior to 1978, private

transactions in land is still continuing with people still buying land from individuals

and having the transaction backdated to period before the effective date of the

Decree, C. of O. is only obtained for the purpose of validating the transaction.

At the commencement date, the Decree empowered the government to

compulsorily acquire all undeveloped plots within all urban areas, however, till today,

such vacant land on their own and in fact buy from landlords before approaching the

government with application for the same plot already purchased.

However, there are few state land some of which dated to the colonial period

and the supply of which is always lagging behind the demand. Of the 579

applications received with respect to state land between November 1994 and March

1995, 399 plots were allocated in Oyo State. Even, the number of plots made

available by the Local Planning Authorities that are playing complementary roles to

that of the state, have not significantly improved the situation.

For instance, all the four schemes (residential and industrial estates) framed

by the old Ibadan Metropolitan Planning Authority were done before 1978 (that is

Oluyole Estate 1962, Legelu Estate 1972, Oluyole Extension, 1973 and Iwo Road

Scheme 1976). All these comprised only about 1,161 hectares and about 3413 plots

(Wole Merenikeji 1990). Observation has shown that, not only are the plots made

available inadequate but that the few ones available mostly benefit the well

connected people in and of government. This is particularly so for the state Land and

Bodija, Links reservation, Onireke and Jericho all in Ibadan, the state capital.

Apart from the adequate supply of land, processing the C. of O. itself is costly

and cumbersome. The processing fee has more than double between 1988 and

1995, for instance, the fee for the application form has jumped from N10.00 in 1988

to N200.00 in 1995. An average of 89 C. of O application was received every month

while an average of 52 were used between January 1992 and March 1995 as shown

in table 3. This means t6he number of C. of O. issued in Oyo State can be attributed

to several factors.

Ideally, to process the C. of O. documents should not take more than three

months but in reality it takes between one to three years,. The man or reasons

identified during the study are:

1. Inadequate monitoring of the application by the applicant at every important

stage during processing. To the western observers, this factor may sound

absurd (since people are paid to do this job in the ministries).

Many applicants after registering their applications abadon it, forgetting the

inspection stage whereby they need to take officials from the ministry to their

site for physical inspection. Ideally the ministry is supposed to invite the

applicant by writing for the inspection.

2. Non submission of record copy of survey plan to the survey Department of the

Ministry by the Surveyor that prepared it in respect of the applicant’s parcel of

land.

3. Errors detected on the survey plan on inspection or at the charting stage. This

may necessitate the preparation of another survey plan.

4. Delays as a result of bureaucracy on the part of the officials of the Ministry.

5. More importantly the frequent changes of the Principal officers connected with

the C. of O. preparation, that is, State Governor, and Commissioner, Director-

General, etc, in the Ministry.

To acquire a plot of land eventually obtain the statutory right of occupancy and

certificate of occupancy in Niger state, one can follow to different approaches, these

are through:

1. The government

2. The Ward head (Mai-Unguwa)

State Land:

Under the first method, an applicant may apply directly to the state or local

government for land.

Usually there are state land and in very few cases local government land

have been acquired, subdivided and properly demarcated and for which

compensation have been paid as required by the Land use decree. An applicant is

required to obtain the application form at a cost of N200.00 which will be

accompanied by two passport photographs, declaration of age/birth certificate, a tree

year tax clearance certificate and a deposit which varies according to uses and

location (town) upon submission. The amount (deposit) paid for various uses is

presented in table 2. Although Minna is the state capital, land in Suleja is more highly

demanded and highly prized because of its close proximity to Abuja, the Nation’s

Capital City hence all fees payable with respect to land is always highest. If the

application is successful, the applicant is issued the statutory Right of Occupancy

which entitles him to develop the land. This is signed by the commissioner in charge

of land. At this point, the applicant starts to pay the annual ground rent which also

varies with the use of land and size.

With the collection of the statutory Right of Occupancy Certificate, many

applicants do not go further to apply for the C. of O. until it is required for other

purposes, such as mortgage. To process the C. of O. the applicant is required to

pay, what is referred to as, the initial bill. This covers the most of surveying,

compensation and certificate preparation. This fee (initial bill) is not fixed. It is

interesting to note that most of the time the plots of land in posse ion of the

government are not surveyed until they are being allotted to successful applicants.

Also, the cost of compensation paid with respect to the acquisition of land is

recovered from the applicants. When all these fees have been paid, the certificate is

then prepared and passed through the commissioner in charge of land to the state

governor for endorsement. This process have been found to take between one to

five years depending on how closely the application is followed up by the application.

Community Land:

In view of the fact that before 1976, land in Northern Nigeria was communally owned

and couple with the fact that land under the state control at present is inadequate to

meet the demand for various uses, prospective land owners to a large extent still

resort to purchasing land from local authorities, in spite of the land use decree.

Under this method, an applicant approaches the wardhead-(Mai-Unguwa) in respect

of parcel of land of interest. An agreed fee is paid to the wardhead and an

agreement is signed for the transfer of land. In some cases, some wardheads have

standard application forms.

To legalise this transaction, the applicant submits a sketch plan of his site together

with a completed application form to State’s Area Office (Land) from where site

inspection is done. If the site meets all the requirements expected, the file is sent to

the Laand Division (headquarters) for survey and charting and then to the Town

Planning Department for approval and the back the Land Division where the normal

process for the application for the Statutory Right of Occupancy and C. of O. will

begin. Where land on which the C. of O. has been issued is transferred to another

person, consent fees are paid to the government. The fees payable vary with size of

plot in hectares as in table 3.

As with the Oyo State case, a number of problems are associated with the issuance

of C. of O. These include:

1. Frequent change of government. There were cases where the new governor

or the commissioner refused to give consideration to the pending cases for

upward of six months upon assumption of office.

2. When land has been subdivided by the Town Planning Depatment, often there is

lack of fund for the perimeter survey by the survey department.

Table 1: Allocation of Government Land Nov. 1994-March 1995.

Period Application Allocation

November 1994 69 24

December 1994 30 25

January 1995 250 250

February 1995 125 50

March 1995 105 50

Total 579 399

Source: Ministry of Lands, Housing and Physical Planning, Ibadan,1998.

Table 2: Deposit paid for different Uses

Types of Usse Minna Deposit in Naira(N) Suleja Others

Residential 600 2500 500

Commercial 1500 5000 1000

Industrial 3000 10000 3000

Petrol Station 3000 5000 2000

Private School 1500 3000 800

Farmland 500 3000 1000

Livestock 500 1000 500

Grazing 500 1000 500

Quarry 25000 30000 25000

Source: Ministry of Works, Lands, Survey and Town Planning, Minna, (1995).

3. Even, when land has been acquired by the government, inability to pay

compensation over the land usually delay the actual take-over. This is common in

Suleja where illegal buildings have been erected on the supposedly state land.

4. There is also the problem of inadequacy of vehicles for field work and site

inspection.

Also noted, and of great concern, is the poor state of record keeping. Today, no

one can say for sure, the number of plots available and/or allocated for different land

uses, or the number of C. of O. issued so far by the government.

Though the plot statistics are contained on the layout sheets, with time and with use

the sheets are worn out and the information are lost. The social and political

circumstances surrounding the issuance of C. of O., will not allow accurate records

to be kept. There is no doubt that most of the state lands are possessed by top

government functionaries, top military men and powerful businessmen. As soon as

layouts are prepared and as soon as the implementers (turned land speculators) got

their own allocations, the plots are exhausted. This is why local arrangements

through the wardheads are existing side by side with the state governments.

IMPLICATIONS OF FINDINGS

The study has revealed a number of facts which tend to make the existing

practices of land administration a mockery of the ideals of the Land Use Decree and

which therefore call for a revision. The immediate impact of uncoordinated and

cumbersome land administration process is seen in the continuing organic growth of

urban centres in Nigeria as typified by Ibadan and Suleja, which has made nonsense

of whatever development plan or Master Plans prepared to guide their growth.

In Suleja (Niger State) there is a constant friction between the Local Government

Authority and the State Town Planning Department over the rate at which illegal

structures are springing up. A case in point, which is currently raging on, concerns a

parcel of land belonging to a community primary school. The land in question

belonged to some individuals but as the need arose to establish a primary school for

the growing community, the owners voluntarily surrendered their land tor the

community and the school was built. Recently, a few influential individuals

approached the Local Government Authority for portion of the unoccupied land in the

school. The Local Government subdivided the land and allocated the demarcating

the school’s land with the intention of putting up residential structures – an action

which the Town Planning Department is now kicking against. The problems here are:

1. Responsibility for the Management of Primary School in the country has

continued to be shifted from one authority to another from Local – State – Federal

– Local and now the National Primary Education Board. Moreover, the assets of

these schools have not been properly documented.

2. The dual (State and Local) control of land especially in urban centres contrary to

the provision of the Land Use Decree which vests the control of all urban lands

solely in the State Governor,

3. A poor record keeping system which has allowed, inadvertently, the issuance of

C. of O, to multiple applicants for a supposedly state land (that is the Primary

School).

The most problematic area in Suleja, is the Madalla area along the road to

Federal Capital, Abuja. Here the planners are watching helplessly as

spontaneous development is taking place (NITP, 1993). Though the area has

been acquired by the state government orderly allocation of land and layout

development cannot be carried out because the original owners have not been

compensated as required by the Decree. In fact, since 1988, no compensation

has been paid in Suleja Local Government Area.

In Oyo State too, Olatubara(1993) has observed that direct guidance of land use

pattern appears not to be very effective since the promulgation of the land Use

Decree because of the secret transactions in land and land development. Town

Planning Authorities in the State, having realized these problems have adopted a

mild compromise to control development in the urban centres. According to

Olatubara (1993) “Land Owner” with private layouts were given “approvals” to

operate their plans as “unregistered” layouts for the purposes of ensuring that

developments comply with certain requirements.

The decree envisaged that acquisition of land would be easier than hitherto,

however, in practice, this has not been found to be correct. Cases of inter-

government (Federal/ State/Local) and government/community clashes of interest

are common. These conflicts have resulted in the stalling of public projects such

as public housing in the past (especially during the last civilian regime 1979-83) in

states that were not controlled by the ruling party. Even at present time, this

factor is responsible for the absence of any Federal Government sites and

services project in the Delta State.

In Delta State, the site chosen for the project is the undeveloped parcel of land

belonging to a Federal College. The land was freely given to the Federal

Government for the establishment of the college. Now the government wants to

develop a part of the land into residential plots which will eventually be allocated

to influential and perhaps non-indigenes. The donor families are now running a

legal battle with the government for over two years now.

Two fundamental moral and philosophical questions then arise:

1. Is it proper for government to change the use of land when change of use is

not permitted by planning by law?

2. Is it proper for the government to acquire land free of charge from indigenous

families for public use (educational) and later subdivide part of the land into

residential plots for private use?

CONCLUSION

In view of the problems highlighted above, there is the need for an amendment of the

relevant section of the Land Use Decree. Furthermore, since the government has not

been able to supply land at the right quantity to meet public and private demands, it

is expedient that the section that limits the size of land to 0.5 hectare per person in

the urban area should be revised to enable private and corporate property

developers acquire and develop more land. The revision should contain checks

which will control land transfer or land speculation. Also, the Development Controls

Unit of the Town Planning Departments should be strengthened and well equipped in

terms of mobility, being the “eye” of the Department, in order to effectively police

the urban centres.

Planning education should be carried to, and intensified in, all local government

areas by virtue of their headquarters being designated as urban centres by various

state governments. Governments at all levels should make land information system

an integral part of the planning, research and statistics unit of the Ministry or

Department in charge of land matters. Above all, staff training in Geographical

Information System is essential in order to keep abreast of the latest land

management and administration techniques.

REFERENCES

Brocklebank, Jack, Nicholas Kaldor et al (1972) The Case for Nationalizing Land cited in Okpala DCI (1980). “Accessibility Distribution Aspects of Public Urban Land Management A Nigerian Case”. Habitat International 4 (4,5,6):593-609.

Faruacque C. and MC. Auslan D. (1992); Reforming Urban Land Policies and Institutions in Developing Countries. Urban Management Programme. The World Bank, Washington D.C. Pg. V.

Federal Republic of Nigeria (1992), Land Use Decree No.6, Official Gazette Extra-Ordinary 65(14) Government Notice 272.

James R.W.(1987): Nigerian Land Use Act: policy and principles. University of Ife Press, IIe-Ife P.1.

Morenikeji Wole (1990): “Land Use Decree and Urban Planning” Daily Sketch Newspaper May 4, P.7.

Nigerian Institute of Town Planners (1993): “Problems of Land Speculations Physical Planning in Suleja Niger State”. A Memorandum submitted to the Niger State Government.

Ola C.S. (1984): Town and Country Planning and Environmental Laws in Nigeria. University Press Ibadan.

Olatubara Charles O.(1993): “Ten Years of the Land Use Decree (Act) in Nigeria (1978-1988): The Oyo State Experience”. The Quarterly Journal of Administration O.A.U. Ile-Ife 27(1&2):85-96.