The Executive Secretary of the Lands Commission, Alhaji Sulemana Mahama, has summoned his staff and admonished them on the need to start changing their attitudes towards work to help change the negative image of the Commission.

This change, according to him, will act as a catalyst for improving upon service delivery and help deliver the core mandate of the Commission.

Alhaji Mahama noted that change must emanate from within hence the decision for the Commission’s Management to interact with staff across all regions to remind staff of their core duties.

He observed that stakeholders and clients’ dissatisfaction at the Commission’s services keep heightening with time, a situation that has become a great source of worry thereby calling for an attitudinal change to change the narrative for the lands outfit.

“I cannot pretend to be working hard when my staff do not have a renewal of mind and attitude when they have a task to perform by making sure that the turnaround time for land services is 30 days, which is at the heart of the Government,” he noted.

He said staff of the Commission have the requisite skills and expertise to deliver and has therefore entreated them to ensure that they bring their experiences to bear on their work.

He asked staff to desist from their rent-seeking behaviour and understand that they are employed to deliver.

“As the government agency mandated to register deeds and any instruments that affect land throughout the country, we have to instil order and discipline into the land market. We must do this through curbing the incidences of land encroachment, unapproved developments schemes; multiple or illegal land sales; land speculation and other forms of land racketeering, it is imperative to start changing if reforms would ever take place at the commission,” he noted.

He called for stronger collaborations with stakeholders like LUSPA, MDA’s and MMDA’s to ensure the success of their operations.

The Chairman of the National Lands Commission, Stephen Ayesu Ntim who has been Touring all the Regions with some Executive Management advised staff to ensure that the government’s dream of moving all land records from the manual environment to the digital is realised.

He said he was aware of the many challenges that confront the Commission among which are low salaries and lack of motivation; inadequate staff; lack of office space; lack of equipment and instruments; among others.

According to him, plans were underway to ensure staff are well equipped to deliver.

The onus, according to him, is on the staff to justify their inclusion and change from their old ways of doing things by realizing that as the vision of the Commission states, “Becoming a centre of excellence for land delivery services is achievable”.

He called for an urgent need to cut down on all unnecessary bureaucracies to ensure there is improvement in service delivery.

The Deputy Executive Secretary, Corporate Services, Mr Jones Ofori-Boadu noted that the government has not relented on bringing major interventions to the Commission in spite of the many challenges.

He said the Ghana Enterprise land Information System (GELIS) which is software being piloted in about three Districts in Accra would bring speed to the Commission’s work when it is fully rolled out for easy archival and retrieval of information.

He said the government will soon conclude plans to map out the whole country to set the tone for major sectional maps for some areas to be declared as Registration Zones.

The Team has been touring some regions and has paid courtesy calls on regional ministers and chiefs in their respective regions.

Such engagements have become so necessary to understand the issues of land acquisition, management, compensations and related land services as the Commission has realized that land problems differ from one region to the other.