Orengo: The Government won’t buy illegally acquired land to settle the IDPs

“We are developing a legal mechanism to repossess such land in an expeditious manner because our experience has shown that court cases involving land take six to seven years,” he said.

He also announced that his ministry was developing a Land Amendment Act that would set up a tribunal to ensure land irregularly acquired is repossessed very quickly.

The ministry has already cancelled title deeds acquired corruptly, while some people who have acquired land by irregular means have also started surrendering it to the Government, he pointed out.

Mr Orengo clarified that only arable land would be bought. The Government would not buy land from people who received it from the Government and failed to develop it.

“We are saying that if you were given land by the Government, say 10 years ago, but you have not done anything on it and you now want to sell it to the Government at the prevailing market rates, we will not buy it because we will not get the value for the money,” he said.