Disbanding land boards alone won’t stop rampant corruption

The land sector has over the years scored highly as one of the bastions of corruption in Kenya.

In land registries across the country, frustrated elderly men and women can easily be spotted carrying heaps of documents, each person having a tale of how their land problems have yet to be resolved after many years.

Every time a new Land minister is appointed, Kenyans hope that he or she will end, or at least reduce, the corruption in the sector.

It was no different when Prof Jacob Kaimenyi was appointed Lands cabinet secretary. On April 29, he disbanded all land control boards representing 57 registries.

This was timely and welcome. Land boards draw their mandate from the Land Control Act and their primary role is controlling transactions in agricultural land.

Historically, the boards were established to bring some control over transactions involving native agricultural land that was sold by foreigners at exorbitant prices.

One must obtain consent from the board before undertaking any transaction that affects agricultural land.

The boards are composed of a district commissioner (now deputy county commissioner) or a district officer (assistant county commissioner) as the chairperson, two public officers, and seven residents who have agricultural land within the jurisdiction of the board, and who are appointed by the Cabinet secretary.

To effectively fill the gaps exploited to advance corruption, the institutional framework of the boards needs reform, not just mere staff change.

To start with, there is ambiguity about the tenure of office of the boards. A term limit should be specified.

That way, they can be subjected to appraisal, encouraging them to yield better performance. As it is, land boards’ unlimited term has bred lethargy and helped build cartels.

Further, timeliness in regard to discharging their mandates should be enshrined within their operations to tame laxity.

The Agricultural Appeals Tribunal should be the appellate body. The provincial and central appeal boards do not meet the stature of a quasi-judicial body, thus they can be easily compromised in terms of delivering impartial and fair administrative justice.

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There was rampant corruption in land boards, one of the reasons for their disbandment. Institutional corruption has been advanced by the gaps that exist in the operations of the boards.

This, therefore, means that changing the individuals who sit in these boards is merely cosmetic and does not constitute a strategy to fight corruption.

Radical action, backed by sector players, is needed to identify and seal the loopholes in the institutional framework that allows corruption to thrive.

Ironically, the justification for the existence of the boards is to enable the citizens to use land as a factor of production and put it to good economic use.

The present system does not foster these core values. Often, agricultural land has been sub-divided into pieces that are not agriculturally viable.

The boards enjoy wide discretion without adequate mechanisms for accountability, leading to great variations in decision-making.

Land control boards should borrow a leaf from county land management boards in terms of accountability and efficiency.

Frequent disbandment of land control boards delays the discharge of their mandates and ultimately justice to their clients.

By the time the new boards will be in place, much harm will have been done to stalled transactions.

Furthermore, the government loses revenue when the boards are disbanded without a clearer framework of transition.

The method that the Ministry of Lands has chosen to manage the inefficiencies of land control boards is cosmetic and will not solve the challenges the boards are facing.

There is a need for deeper engagement and concise conclusions informing the actions to be taken to genuinely reform the boards. The approach should be pragmatic.

The writer is a programme officer at the Social Economic Rights Centre. [email protected].