Lands Commission to investigate malpractices…at its Sekondi office

THE Western Regional Secretariat of the Lands Commission (LC) has indicated its readiness to investigate alleged falsification of records at the Secretariat.

The Acting Regional Director of the Commission, Mr. Muhammed Abidu Alhassan, who disclosed this to The Chronicle in an interview, noted that the Secretariat was not ready to sacrifice its reputation by sitting idle, whilst some staff members were allegedly doing untoward thing for their personal gain.

Mr. Abidu, however, pointed out that Commission could only change the deeds or records of land, only on the orders of a competent court of law.

Even with this, according to the Acting Director, the commission apprises the owner of the land.

The Acting Regional Director further told this reporter that the protection of land records was the prime agenda of the commission, and as such the Secretariat would not condone acts that would soil the reputation of the commission.

“What we are holding here are public records, and we have to protect them so that people can rely on us for the safekeeping of land documents.”

Mr. Abidu Alhassan said the commission had for the past three years, been recording increments in revenue targets set by the Secretariat. Last year, for instance, the Commission exceeded its revenue target by 64%.

The Chronicle recently published agitations by some workers of the commission, expressing worry about how the commission was loosing revenue in the region, due to the absence of a substantive director to steer the affairs of the secretariat.

The workers had further expressed worry over the slow processing of land documentation.

Responding, the Director gave the assurance that the commission was taking steps to clear the backlog of land documents before it, explaining that the challenges or difficulties in clearing the backlog of the land documents were one of the internal problems.

He disclosed that the commission was putting in innovative measures such as networking, to facilitate the processing of land documentations.

He advised clients to deal directly with the office for the processing of their land documents, and not engage middlemen.