Chiefs go high-tech to solve land problems

To help improve land security and acquisition, traditional authorities in the Ashanti region have been learning ICT skills in land administration to help renew investor confidence.

Model II of the programme, Service Management and Leadership for Traditional Authorities, run by the Osei Tutu II Centre for Executive Education and Research (OTCEER) in Kumasi, is currently focusing on ICT and Land Administration.

Asakore Mamponghene, Nana Boakye-Ansah Debrah, who is leading the session, has noted that the application of information communication technology should facilitate the mapping up of stool lands for development purposes.

He has implored chiefs to engage professional planners in land data management within their jurisdiction and ensure they are not swayed to arbitrarily change their plans.

“When you plan that this area can be used for housing, this area can be used for farming or industry, you just stick to your planning principle and you don’t change it," he said. “We’re teaching ourselves how someone has done it and how it’s been successful."

Nana Boakye-Ansah cited his community as an example of how planning can lead to development and promote peaceful co-existence.

“There has never been double allocation in my area and revenues that come from the sales of lands are distributed equally; there is transparency and because of that I don’t have problems with my people and I don’t have problem with the outsiders," he stated.

The first batch of 30 chiefs drawn from the Ashanti Regional House of Chiefs is being exposed to innovative ideas in the discharge of routine duties in their communities.

The programme was launched last month with the aim to enhance the role of traditional institutions in the country’s socio-economic development.

Head of the OTCEER, Nana Otuo Acheampong, has exposed the chiefs to the World Bank’s 2013 report: “Growing Africa: Unlocking the Potential of Agribusiness”.

According to the report Africa’s farmers and agribusinesses could create a trillion-dollar food market by 2030 if they can expand their access to more capital, electricity, better technology and irrigated land to grow high-value nutritious foods.

Nana Otuo noted that chiefs as custodians of land can help put the uncultivated land resources to productive use.

The four-modular programme is funded by the China Europe International Business School (CEIBS) – covers service management and innovation, leadership and land administration, contemporary issues in leadership and financial management for chiefs as leaders.

Director of Programmes at the CEIBS, Prof. Mathew Tsamenyi is enthused at the interest of the chiefs to translate the acquired knowledge into action.

“At the end of it all, what we’re hoping for is to have different roles for traditional institutions as partners in development and we’ll be able to transform areas without necessarily relying on international donors or the government to come and do it for them”, he observed.

There is international interest in the programme as people begin to understand that the traditional institutions can be used as an alternative vehicle to deliver development goods, he said.

The programme would be run for chiefs and queen mothers in all ten regions of the country and hopefully extended to other African countries.