Land Tenure Reform Crucial Component of Future Peace in Africa: Part II

By Katherine Hubbard

Last week’s blog post discussed how land disputes left unresolved can escalate into major crises, but land tenure reform is necessary for more than just crisis prevention.  Even when land disputes are not the cause of the crisis, they are of critical importance in the post-conflict period.  The end of a prolonged armed conflict will see a large portion of the population claiming or reclaiming access to land, with important implications for return, recovery, and reintegration.  If these issues are overlooked, they are likely to threaten the fragile stability of post-conflict transitions.

Land disputes are prevalent in post-conflict areas because the movement of internally displaced persons (IDPs) and refugees disturb settlement patterns, land use, and the property market. Disputes arise for a variety of reasons: residents may return to their homes to find that their property has become occupied by others during the conflict; there may be competing claims over the same plot; there can be disputes within families over the inheritance of land; documentation can get lost or destroyed; or returnees may find that the ethnic composition of their villages has changed, and may therefore have to seek alternative livelihoods elsewhere.

When Korkesi Jabateh’s family fled Liberia during the second civil war, the only thing they took with them was the deed to their land, knowing it would be indispensable when they wished to return home.  The Jabatehs owned a gas station and the extended family lived in houses behind the building.  When Jabateh returned, he found that nine families had moved into his family’s homes and two dozen more had built makeshift shelters in the parking lot of his gas station.  Although his deed gives him the upper hand, Jabateh is reluctant to force the squatters off his land because he fears conflict.  As an ethnic Mandingo, he now finds himself an unwelcome minority in an area that has become occupied by people from the Gio and Mano tribes.  He is also sympathetic to the plight of the IDPs, saying “These families have nowhere to go.  The war brought them here.”

So far humanitarian agencies have tended to avoid land-related issues.  IDPs and refugees are usually encouraged to return to their areas of origin once a conflict has ended; however, return is much more complex than it may appear.  Refugees and IDPs may never have had property in the first place, they may be unable to access their property, or they may have settled on property that they know doesn’t belong to them, but they have nowhere else to go.

Several countries in Africa are working to reform their land policies in the hopes of better establishing property rights and avoiding these post-conflict troubles.  Following the civil war and the 1994 genocide, it became clear that Rwanda’s land policies needed to be reformed.  In 1997 Rwanda’s government implemented a policy of “village-ization,” aimed at reducing land-related tensions through a program of resettlement and land allocation to returning refugees.  The chosen pattern was to build a large number of new housing facilities (called imidugudu) in a relatively small area outside of an existing village.  Other forms of resettlement were forbidden within a village and all returnees were moved into imidugudu.  They were then allocated plots of land in large fields.  The goal of this was to minimize wasteland, hence leading to more efficient use of the land.  The program has so far shown mixed results.  Further changes came in 2005 when Rwanda’s reformed national land law came into effect.  The new law abolished customary land tenure, although rights previously obtained are protected.  All land in the country is now required to be registered and titled and a mechanism for dispute resolution has been created.

It is important that land claims and land grievances be addressed promptly at the end of a conflict.  Agreements should seek to protect customary and long-term occupancy until mechanisms to deal with disputes are fully operational.  Short-term capacity-building efforts could strengthen the institutions that handle refugee repatriation and integration.  Prevention is also important.  Simple and inexpensive registration programs for people with customary rights to their land could help their rights become legally recognized

Fixing the land problem in Africa could lay the foundation for fixing many other problems such as poverty, famine and ethnic conflicts.  If farmers feel that their plots are safe, social groups feel that land policies are impartial and just, and if men and women have equal rights to land, experts say that other problems will be easier to resolve.  The end of land conflicts could mean new hope for peace throughout Africa.

Flickr photo by Neil Palmer (CIAT) used under a Creative Commons license.