The Law Society of Kenya and the Institution of Surveyors of Kenya staged a protest on January 20, before petitioning Lands CS over failures brought about by the new system.
The National Land Information Management System also known as Ardhisasa was launched on April 27, 2021, and is supposed to cure challenges facing the land sector.
Developed by a team of Kenyan techies over a three-year period, Ardhisasa was designed to enhance the security of land records, speed up land transactions and curb fraud.
Today, stakeholders are up in arms saying the system has created inefficiencies that it was supposed to cure.
LSK wrote a 15-page protest letter while the Institution of Surveyors of Kenya put its frustration to the ministry through an eight-page letter.
The two petitions in our possession were received on Friday by Lands PS Nixon Korir who pledged to look into issues raised by LSK and surveyors.
LSK and surveyors say between Sh100 billion and Sh200 billion have been lost due to inefficiencies.
The Ardhisasa platform allows landowners to lodge applications for various services offered by the Ministry and the National Land Commission.
The applications are handled through the platform and responses are presented through it.
This was aimed at bringing to an end to manual land transactions in Nairobi.
The Ardhisasa platform is operational in Nairobi and plans are underway to be expanded countrywide.
The platform sought to limit or remove the human element and interaction as much as possible and frustrate land cartels, which had overrun corridors at the ministry.
Under the new system, a Kenyan can search for land transactions, transfers and registrations in the comfort of their home.
At the click of a button, citizens will carry out online transactions, drastically reducing human interactions—a frequent source of fraud and a definite cause of delays and inconveniences.
The system will require the Lands ministry to digitise land records, streamlining records of transactions and ownership, a move that was aimed at eliminating fraud, corruption and manipulation of critical land records.
The system was also meant to do away with long queues at the registries.
Challenges noticed in the ministry such as double registration and double allocation will also be eliminated as records will be cleaned.
Since Independence, land has been an emotive matter, owing to historical injustices, fraud and the manipulation of land documents at Ardhi House.
All these however seem to have failed.
LSK says the system has failed to cure some of the challenges that were intended to be handled.
The society says Ardhisasa is not yet fully functional and is affected by several gaps in law as well as transitional and implementation inefficiencies which have resulted in poor service delivery.
The society says the platform was implemented before the relevant legal and regulatory framework was fully in place.
“The system has not fully factored the key enabling requirements under the Land Registration Act, 2012 and the Land Registration (Electronic Transactions) Regulations 2020, the Land Regulations (General) Order 2017, and the Communications Act, among others,” LSK says.
LSK says there need for the ministry to engage with the Communication Authority to ensure compliance with the law by ensuring electronic signatures are adopted on the Ardhisasa platform for purposes of execution of instruments.
The society says the adoption of electronic signatures will ensure adequate integrity, security and confidentiality of electronic execution and attestation of instruments.
“This is a key requirement for sanctity of title.”
LSK says the Ardhisasa system has been in place without adhering to these requirements and this makes the signatures susceptible to challenge and the system susceptible to identity fraud.
The society says registration of foreigners on the Ardhisasa platform has varying results and procedures and generally happens, if it does, after a considerable delay.
LSK says there is verification exercise with the Immigration Department that is not clear.
It said there is need for proper guidelines on the process with timelines and expected outcomes.
LSK says the lack of clear guidelines and the requirement for verification makes it extremely difficult for advocates to advise their clients.
The society wants the ministry to ensure the manual records during this transitional period are kept at the Registry.
It also wants the introduction of at least three-year transition period for a manual back up system to run alongside the electronic system until all records and data are available and verified on the electronic system and the electronic registry is fully operational without the common glitches currently being witnessed.
The Kenya Gazette Notice dated November 8, 2019, covered the appointments of many boards countrywide for a period of three years from November 1, 2019.
The tenure of the office of members of these Land Control Boards expired on October 31, 2022.
This means that land dealings on all the areas where the terms of the board members have expired are affected and effectively held in abeyance due to lack of land control board consents.
Without consents, the transactions cannot proceed to registration.
The dealings affected include transfers, charges, and leases among others, with significant impact in revenue generation.
LSK wants an extension for three months to ensure continuity of business.
The society now wants an extension on moratorium for conversion of titles under long term leases for at least five years and rationalised, to allow time for compliance.
The society now wants an audit on the new system with relevant stakeholders.
Surveyors on the other hand have also made a raft of demands saying the new system needs a lot of improvement before it’s fully rolled out.
It says the ministry should establish a database for searches for titles that are yet to be registered online.
The surveyors said there should be a digital database to address the issue of double allocation of title deeds and that digitisation for all parcels of land in Nairobi should be completed immediately.
“The ministry should work in consultation with the Institution of surveyors of Kenya to get expertise to help come up with a more robust system that will handle the real issues on the ground,” surveyors said calling for an immediate onboarding of all properties on ArdhiSasa platform.
The surveyors said there is need to fast track the re-issuance of title with new title numbers that should be finalised in 90 days.
Land sector in the country has often been riddled with corruption.
It requires the migration of all parcels to one regime, the Registry Index Maps (Rims).
Rims will replace deed plans as registration instruments for land.
The deed plans have been prone to manipulation.
All this will ensure uniformity of land ownership in Kenya and minimise fraud.
The conversion will enhance security of land records, speed up land transactions, and minimise fraud and corruption that have pervaded land offices.
In what will speed up transactions, the conversion services will be decentralised to the regions as there will be migration of registers and files to county registries.
