Written by OTIATO GUGUYU, posted on May 3, 2014 (7 hours ago)

Ardhi House will be closed to the public for two weeks to conduct an audit and reorganisation of land registries.

The central registry, the Nairobi registry and the records registry will all be closed for the exercise to clean up the ministry.

The Ministry of Land Housing and Urban Development said the programme would also extend to other regions.

Service delivery

“To ensure efficient administration and management of land resources, the Lands Directorate has set up a programme of re-engineering our business processes with a view of reducing the turn-around time on service delivery,” the notice by Cabinet Secretary Charity Ngilu read.

The banking hall will also be closed bringing several operations to a halt. Registrations of land documents, searches, stamp duty payments, land rent payment and application for valuations and processing will not be done during the period.

Other affected services include payments of allotments, application for subdivision of land, settlement programmes and land adjudication. The ministry said it was exercising its power to facilitate efficient land administration and management entrusted to it.

This comes even as the Parliament sought to unlock the confusion over land management in the country.

In a closed door meeting with the Constitutional Implementation Oversight Committee, the National Lands Commission, headed by Mr Muhammad Swazuri, said it was ready to have its recommendations on the required changes to the Land policy ready for consideration by the Lands ministry in two months.

Mrs Charity Ngilu was reported to have said the ministry would need three months to work on the changes.