In order to address the never-ending land issues in the country, the national government is planning a second phase of digitization of the land registries in the country next month. – By Ramadhan Kambi.
According to Lands CS Faridah Karoney, the ministry has identified 20 counties among them Tanariver county where she opened the first registry since independence.
Speaking after launching the Tanariver Lands Registry Ms Karonei said the digitization process is set to be completed by 2024 and is part of the government agenda to ensure land records are digitized in the country.
“If we look at the records, 70 per cent of the lands in the country are neither documented nor registered and most of those are community lands and that is why it was important to begin the national titling program. Specifically, implementation of the community land registration became a priority program in the ministry,” she said.
Under the digitalization program The CS said they have already completed digitizing one of the two registries in Nairobi and the second one shall be completed in July.
“I made the decision that Tanariver will be among the 20 registries that will be digitalized in phase two because you have a very good registry, you have the technology and there is no reason as to why we shouldn’t digitalize your records,” she said
On national titling the CS said they begun implementation of the community land act in 2019 even though the law came into place in 2016.
“We have done public participation in all the 24 counties identified and that they have already gazzetted community land registrars,” she said.
The CS said Tanariver is one of the counties with very low number of tittles which are less than 2000 and with the plan they intend to increase the numbers so that people get land ownership documents.
“Since president Uhuru Kenyatta took office, we have been able to process over 5million tittle deeds while the other three previous presidents processed 6 million tittle deeds so we have 12 million tittle deeds,” she said.
Ms Karoney said there was need to reform the Ministry of lands as many Kenyans have to contend with a lot of challenges while seeking services.
“We are also in the process of decentralizing the lands Ministry to enable people to easily access services instead of going to neighboring counties. In Tanariver for example, we have a surveyor, registrar valuer and soon will have a physical planner to ensure all services are accessible in the county,” she said.
Tanariver County she added will be among those which will be digitalized before the end of 2021 adding that when she visits the county next year, they will be fully digital.
The CS said the registrar who was dispatched in Tanariver will also double up as community land registrar and will be able to register community land adding that they have also gazette adjudication officers and are ready to implement the community land act.
Also, present was the Governor Tana river county Dhadho Godhana, FAO Representative in Kenya Carla Mukavi, EU Envoy in Kenya Katrin Hagemann.Food and Agricultural organization through the support of EU funded the construction of the registry at a cost of Sh18 million.
Mr Godhana said the opening of the new registry was a key milestone in ensuring that locals are able to get land ownership documents. He said they have already done a pilot project of two community land registration who will be able to get their land ownership documents.
He urged the residents of Tanariver to support such initiatives aimed at ensuring the locals get land documents instead of opposing any projects. The EU envoy on her part said they were happy to be support the program which is aimed at ensuring people get their land rights.
She said they have also supported other eight counties in Kenya under similar program. The FAO representative said they will also continue supporting Tanariver county to ensure the livelihoods of the people are transformed.
