’Separate Survey Dept from National Lands Commission’

Page 46: Daily Graphic, February 15, 2010.
Story: Albert K. Salia
THE staff of the Survey Department have petitioned the President to separate the department from the new National Lands Commission, which is an amalgamation of four agencies.
They were of the view that if the department was not removed from the merger, its main mandate of surveying and mapping would be killed under the current Lands Commission.
In the petition, the workers said they envisaged “a lack of direction and transparency at the policy level with respect to survey and mapping in the country and that will be detrimental to the overall development of the nation as a whole”.
They contended that several memoranda sent to Parliament prior to the enactment of Act 767 went unheeded.
According to them, their fears were confirmed when appointments to the three top positions of the new Lands Commissions went to land economists and not a single land surveyor.
“Your Excellency, permit us to inform you that the above appointees are all land economists from the old lands commission whose training and background are the same as against the land surveyor from Survey Department whose training and job functions are entirely different in nature,” they noted.
Under Act 767, four land sector agencies — the Survey Department, Lands Commission, Land Valuation Board and the Land Title Registry — were merged into one National Lands Commission as part of efforts to improve land administration in the country.
According to the workers, preparation of site plans was not the core duties of the department, stressing that “the very fibre of development in every nation is hinged on a vibrant survey and mapping component”.
They contended that the role of the surveyor was so significant that the Surveyor-General in Nigeria was of Cabinet status.
According to them, the old Lands Commission, Land Valuation Board, Land Title Registry and Office of the Administrator of Stool Lands, had a common ancestry in the former Lands Department, which was itself created out of the Survey Department during the colonial period.
They said there was a common link between all the other land sector agencies while the “Survey Department by virtue of its mandate and functions virtually has very little in common with all the other land sector agencies”.
“If the Survey Department is put under the new Lands Commission, whose core functions are mainly on land administration, the department stands the risk of being inactive, since the other functions other than the preparation of cadastral plans could be relegated to the background.
“The Survey Department should remain as the National Mapping Organisation and should remain autonomous,” they demanded.
They said the membership of the Lands Commission as it existed now did not include people with the scientific and technical knowledge and competence to formulate policy and give directions in the performance of the functions of the Survey Department both at the national and regional levels.