Land Law Expect, Kwame Gyan has defended the Lands Ministry's decision to procure the services of a private company, Aynok Holding Limited to reclaim encroached lands.

Speaking on Joy FM’s Newsnight on Monday, Mr Gyan said the act does not in any way go contrary to the laws of the country.

According to him, state entities vested with custodianship of land are “allowed by section 3 of the Public Lands (Protection) Decree, 1974 (NRCD 240) to either take steps themselves to remove trespassers or appoint duly authorised agents to do so on their behalf.”

He continued “so far as I am concerned, if the Ministry of Lands has a contract with a private sector actor to remove encroachers from government lands, there is legal backing for that.”

Mr Gyan’s comment comes after security analyst, Adib Saani questioned why the Lands Ministry decided to engage the services of a private entity to reclaim state lands.

The land law expert says the law permits such an engagement, therefore “if we are not comfortable with the law, we take steps as a country to deal with it.”

When asked whether it was time to review such a law passed in 1974, he said: “We have to go back to the principles that were set out in our constitution in article 106 relating to what is the mischief in the existing law.

“If there is mischief in the existing law, let’s identify the mischief and take steps to make provisions to revise the existing law to address the mischief.”

This, he says is because the law does not take away the opportunity to involve the police but it makes it open to involving any authority or duly authorised agency.

Background

On July 10, during a meeting with Parliament’s Lands and Forestry Committee, the Chief Director of the Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources, Prof Patrick Agbesinyale disclosed that government engaged the services of a known land guard to retrieve and protect encroached state lands.

The Ghana Armed Forces and the Ghana Police Service were also accused of hiring the land guard popularly known as ‘Gyato’ to reclaim their lands that have been encroached. 

Prof Patrick Agbesinyale claimed the security agencies then apportion parts of the reclaimed lands to the land guard as payment for his work. 

“So, he recently reclaimed some lands for us and out of that land, we gave him 50 of 6,000 acres as payment for all his expenses. So he has the right to and sell that 50. If he is selling it, there is noise all over the place.”

“He doesn’t even sell it. He gives it out for people to develop so that he gets his share. I can give you a tall list of lands that Gyato (land guard) has claimed for us to the extent that even the Ghana Armed Forces and the Ghana Police Service their lands that have been encroached, they hire Gyato to reclaim for them,” he claimed.

According to him, the decision not to use the police or the military in protecting and reclaiming lands was to avoid public backlash.

“I think the idea was that anytime the government apparatus; the police, military among others are seen going out there to claim lands, you know the hullabaloo and backlash the government receives.”

“So, what they do is that you would set up somebody like this and the government would literally be hiding behind it so he can reclaim government lands.”

This is in spite of the passage of the Vigilantism and Related Offenses Act, 2019(Act, 999) which clearly criminalises such activities. 

The Lands Ministry in a statement issued on Monday, July 17 refuted the claims of contracting the services of land guards to reclaim state lands.

It however clarified that the Ministry through its agency, Lands Commission legally engaged the services of Aynok Holding Limited, a registered limited liability company to assist in reclaiming encroached government lands.

This engagement, according to them has been in effect since 2012.

“We wish to categorically state that Government and by extension the Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources employs legal processes to reclaim all encroached state lands,” portions of the release stated.

https://myjoyonline.com/we-dont-engage-land-guards-lands-ministrys-chief-directors-claim-false-gaf/

Also, the Ghana Armed Forces and the Police have issued statements to that effect denying the engagement of land guards.