October 22, 2021
Albert Baron Ansu
Everybody knows that land acquisition is a contentious issue. It is not only a Sierra Leonean phenomenon. Why is this an ubiquitous reality on the global scale can be explained in the fact that land is a critical factor of production, a source of income and more crucially the space for shelter in coping with the seasonal reality of rain and shine.
Land is therefore a right based issue subsumed under the social, economic. But how often have we found out that that right subsists with responsibility? This is how civilization and human rights have evolved.
And the centrality of the state in land redistribution makes a lot of sense otherwise we could have witnessed the barbarity of people trying to unleash carnage and mayhem in having control over land. The logic of the state superintending lands in the scope state lands is understandable in the context of protection of the rights of citizens.
Asked any Sierra Leonean which ministry is the most troubling and they are going to tell you that it is the Ministry of Lands and Country Planning. Successive governments have grappled issues of land theft and corruption. Daring citizens and non-citizens continue to cash in acquiring land by crooked methods. The court has been in the vortex of the land scam, aiding and abetting the rackets associated with illegal acquisition of parcel of land. The Police have always been caught up in the drama sometimes for the wrong reason.
During the administration of former President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah then Minister Dr. Bobson Sesay as Lands Minister was very tenacious about dealing with land encroachment and embarked on a wave of demolition. We can still recollect how land official Moore was murdered around hill station.
The stint of Musa Tarawally under the APC was even more chaotic and it arouse the indignation of erstwhile President Koroma to relieve of the office.
The Bio administration explicitly sought to clean the stable. His first appointee Dr. Denis Sandy embarked on radical actions to correct the decay of the past administration. He could have gone overboard to have lost the confidence of the President. And we witnessed the moratorium slammed on state lands. The action of government was justified so that time could be spent in reviewing the system and ensuring policy redirection in creating land bank.
Dr. Turad Senesie is now in charge, positioned on a hot seat, as it were. He has been plodding on in the face of sabotage from within the ministry. But he is gradually getting there so that the catch 22 situation of affording access and foreclosing corruption maintains a fine balance.
The lifting of the land moratorium is in the interest of the country and meets the requirement of protecting the rights of citizens. For why is possible that many citizens had acquired state lands by crooked methods and other citizens cannot using the legal procedure that has been put in place? This is what a pro people government can do to protect the rights of citizens. Now, we can be assured that that the recent unfortunate scenario at IMATT where one man, using cash violence could manipulate state instruments to displace hundreds of citizens. This reprehensible situation must no longer be entertained with Dr. Turad Senesie’s drive in the charted waters of the new direction.