By Bill W. Cooper
The Liberia Land Authority (LLA) has officially launched its nationwide rollout of the awareness campaigns on the Land Rights Act (LRA) and the Liberia Land Authority Act (LLAA).
The Land Rights Act was passed by the National Legislatures on August 23, 2018 and was later signed into law by the President on September 19, 2018 and printed into handbills on October 10 but since that time, there awareness about the LRA across the country had been slow.
Like the LRA, an Act to amend Title 12, Executive Law of the Liberian Codes of Law Revised and to add thereto a new Chapter creating the Liberia Land Authority Act was approved October 5, 2016 and published by authority of the Ministry Foreign Affairs (MFA) on October 6, 2018.
However, addressing a news conference over the weekend at her LLA office in Monrovia, the Vice-Chairperson and Commissioner of Administration and Customer Service, P. Bloh Sayeh stated that the LLA is the agency of government charged with responsibilities for all land matters which includes surveys, registration land use among others as such, the implementation of the Land Rights Law of 2018, is of outmost importance.
Mrs. Sayeh explained that amidst the many challenges relative to the implementation of the LRA, as well as the limited awareness of the LLA; the Authority in collaboration with its development partners and several Civil Society Organization (CSOs) has made an appreciable level of effort in time thus disseminating and raising awareness on the two laws in targeted counties.
According to her, all of these efforts are not enough, considering the extent of responsibilities that the LLA has to efficiently implement these two laws, the LLA with support from the World Bank funded Liberia Land Administration Project (LLAP) has embarked on a four-prone approach ranging from planning, building capacity through training, tolling out of the awareness campaign and the monitoring and evaluating the implementation.
She added, “In order to jumpstart the process, the LLA contracted the services of five national consultants in specialized disciplines. The areas of disciplines are communication, gender, project management and sociologist as the previously organized four regional outreach staff and relevant technical.”
“They also previously organized four regional training workshops on the dissemination of information on the Land Rights Act and the Liberia Land Authority Act. The training activities were conducted in four regional headquarters of Liberia, bringing together surrounding counties based on their geographic proximity,” the LLA acting boss said.
She further said that more than 300 persons were trained from October to December in 2020, noting that that the category of persons trained include local government officials; community mobilizers from targeted communities; local journalists in the counties; selected LLA staffers particularly at the local level and selected CSO organizations from targeted communities.
Additionally, Commissioner Saye explained that individuals have been trained on how to disseminate information in communities on the two Acts, indicating that the training included information on women’s land rights; community engagement and communities techniques as those trained are targeted to assist with the implementation of the nationwide awareness campaign.